PC Resources

By: Steve Robson

Time is money. And when you constantly have to divide your time between your mouse and your keyboard, your workflow rate really slows down.

That's particularly true when you're working on a laptop, where the pointing device is even slower.

The answer - short of growing another arm - is to learn a few "handy" keyboard shortcuts. Here are 10 of the best:

1. Make a quick exit:
ALT - F4 will terminate any program immediately.

2. Flick - don't click:
ALT - TAB to flick through open programs.

3. Make a quick selection:
CTRL - SHIFT and move cursor with left / right / up / down arrows to quickly select areas of text.

4. Cut, copy and paste to the chase:
CTRL - X / C / V to cut, copy and paste selected text.

5. Undo what you've done:
CTRL - Z will undo anything. (And to redo: CTRL - Y although this varies between programs.)

6. Page - don't scroll:
In MSIE use Page Up & Page Down to save time fiddling with the scroll bar.

7. E for explorer:
WINDOWS KEY - E to open windows explorer. Use up and down arrows to quickly navigate through folders.

8. Rapidly rename:
F2 - rename a file or folder in Windows Explorer

9. Find it fast:
CTRL - F to find text on a page (And CTRL - H replace it).

10. Fly through forms:
Use TAB to move forward through forms and SHIFT-TAB to move backwards

After a little practice, your fingers will be flying across the keyboard like a shortcut pro.

And you'll save a huge amount of time too.

Posted in: copy paste, open program, quick exit, rename folder, undo on Saturday, April 19, 2008 at at 8:26 AM 0 comments  

By: Cavyl Stewart

Passwords protect your most sensitive personal, financial and business information. They are the key to accessing membership, financial, and other web sites that you are a member of. All sorts of havoc can occur in your life if some unauthorized person discovers your password. Here are some tips for making that event less likely:

1. Don't use easily guess passwords like a date of birth, spouse, child's or pet's name. In fact, don't use any word or phrase that even remotely relates to you or your world. You need to use a password which is difficult for anyone to guess but is not so difficult for you to remember.

2. Use a combination of upper and lower case letters, symbols and numbers to make the password harder to guess. Some web sites do not allow symbols so you may not be able to always use them. Almost all web sites treat passwords as CaSe SeNsItIvE so mixing case is a good idea.

3. Make your password at least eight characters long. Longer is even better. The more characters there are the harder it will be to guess.

4. Use a different password for each account or web site. That way if one gets compromised you'll still be protected elsewhere.

5. Change your passwords frequently. Pick a period, like the 15th of each month, and change all of your passwords on that date.

6. Do not write your passwords down anywhere. You never know who is checking your drawers or file cabinet when you're not around. Also, do not store your passwords in an electronic filing device like a PDA. That's just as insecure as a piece of paper if you lose the device and someone who is less than honest finds it.

If you have too many passwords to keep track of then consider using a password manager program. There are a lot of them on the market but be careful: some of them contain "adware" which will pop up ads every time you are online. Most of the free password managers contain some degree of adware. Here's one that doesn't: www.roboform.com

7. Never share your password with anyone else. If you have to, then change it immediately afterwards.

8. Avoid using "dictionary" words. There are password-cracking programs that will check every word in the dictionary. If you want to use words then break them up with non-word characters. For example: BuIlT*99$APPlE is difficult for anything other than the most sophisticated password-cracking program to guess because it is combined with non-alphabet characters and it is in mixed case.

9. Don't use "password" or "none" as your password! Don't even use "PaSsWoRd"!

10. If someone calls or sends you e-mail claiming that they are from your bank, or credit card company, or anywhere else that you have a password with, NEVER give them your password or PIN no matter what story they tell you. It's a scam. No one will ever ask for your password. Legitimate administrators of your password-protected accounts do not need your password to access your files during the normal course of their business dealings with you.

Posted in: change password, combination, lower case, password, protected, symbols on at at 8:23 AM 0 comments  

By: GREGORY MBURU

Your system runs noticeably slower than it did before. It could be infected by spyware.

A search toolbar or other browser toolbar appears even though you didn't request or install it. Spyware programs are usually installed with other programs that are advertised in regitimate ways.

You receive an email in your email client with offers related to your recent Internet searches. A spyware might be monitoring your buying habbits.

You enter a search term in Internet Explorer's address bar and press Enter to start the search.
Instead of your usual search site, an unfamiliar site handles the search. A spyware program might be responsible for this.

You get pop-up advertisements when your browser is not running or when your system is not even connected to the Internet, or you get pop-up ads that address you by name. A spyware program could be doing this.

When you start your browser, the home page has changed to something undesirable. Normally to a search portal that the spyware is trying to market.

At a time when you're not doing anything online, the send or receive lights on your dial-up or broadband modem blink just as wildly as when you're downloading a file or surfing the Web. Or the network/modem icon in your system tray flashes rapidly even when you're not using the connection. This could be a spyware program sending out info from your computer.

A new item appears in your Favorites list without your putting it there. No matter how many times you delete it, the item always reappears later. Spyware behaviors are normally very annoying.

Your spyware cure program or another protective program stops working correctly. It may warn you that certain necessary support files are missing, but if you restore the files they go missing again. It may appear to launch normally and then spontaneously shut down, or it may simply crash whenever you try to run it. Some Spyware programs will try to shut down your computer security programs so that they can run without being noticed.

Your phone bill includes expensive calls to 900 numbers that you never made—probably at an outrageous per-minute rate. Spyware programs can cost you thousands of dollars in losses

And the final sign is: Everything appears to be normal. The most devious spyware doesn't leave traces you'd notice! They are sit in your system, malignant and undetected but their destruction is graveus. Try using spyware cure program.

Posted in: crash, downloading files, infected by spyware on at at 8:20 AM 0 comments