SusanGuggenheim-IS Your Answer Blog

How to delete your account information from websites

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 09:49:07 -0500

After a few years of browsing, you probably have quite a few logins dotted around the Internet.

Here's how to delete them from Facebook, Twitter, Google, MySpace, Ebay, etc. -
Smashing Magazine Account Deletion article

Second issue of the Computer Lady column

Sun, 25 Jul 2010 09:10:01 -0500

The Germantown Chronicle this week began what I hope will be my monthly tech column, The Computer Lady. The column is on page 3. It's about shortcuts that will save you a lot of time and wrist strain.

Want a faster Laptop, Netbook?

Sat, 17 Jul 2010 13:18:49 -0500

After months of testing various combinations of security applications, I think I have a good set to recommend for laptop and netbook users, that will not bog you down in real-time scanning.

1) Install and buy the $25 license for
Malwarebytes. This is your anti-malware software and primary defense against Internet malware. I consider this the most essential security product available today.

2) You still need an anti-virus, but the problem with the suites (McAfee, Norton, Vipre) is that they are resource hogs. So let's go for just anti-virus and not Identity, Firewall or Spam protection. I am still recommending AVG Free. Uninstall the trial or subscription suite from Control Panel|Programs BEFORE you install AVG Free. And do choose to install the AVG Browser Toolbar, it's v. useful.

3) Third, you still need spam protection, so use either Windows Defender, which is auto-installed on Windows 7 computers, or download Spybot, which is free, too.

This is a good balance of protection and speed and use of resources, but if you still are slow, then disable Windows Defender/Spybot.

Before I made these changes to a netbook, it was using 880MB of 1GB RAM, and 59 processes just to boot up. After making these changes, it dropped one process to 58, but regained the use of over 230MB memory.

The Computer Lady column begins

Fri, 09 Jul 2010 14:24:02 -0500

The Germantown Chronicle this week began what I hope will be my monthly tech column, The Computer Lady. The column is on page 3.

Living in Germantown: All Together event a success

Fri, 09 Jul 2010 14:20:00 -0500

Here's a link the article in the local paper the Germantown Chronicle, see front page.

We are organizing another LiG event in Sept., and meanwhile ordinary Germantowners continue to make commitments for a More Perfect Germantown.

Want to know what Facebook is sharing about you or your children?

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 08:56:00 -0500

Computer Hope, a very cool tips website, has released this webpage, which, after you enter a Facebook name or email address associated with a Facebook name, will display what it is being shared to other Application developers, who are building programs that will connect to Facebook.

I just checked mine, to make sure that my profile picture was the only shared item, and it is. And please note that shared in this instance means available to APIs that build off or connect to Facebook, it doesn't mean your approved family and friends, who see what you allow from the new Privacy pages in your Account.

I will include graphics, with step by step instructions, in my July newsletter.

Computer Hope's Facebook API Checker

Living in Germantown: All Together event

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 09:29:20 -0500

Most of the time I am teaching computer skills or delivering technical support to local businesses and nonprofits, but occasionally, I'm motivated to do something bigger and better for my community, Germantown, a section of NW Philadelphia, and one of the oldest settlements in Philadelphia.

Along with Betty Turner of Germantown Community Connection, and my local neighborhood association, West Central Germantown Neighbors, we are hosting a community dialogue on race and class called Living in Germantown: All Together.

Our hope is that participants will be encouraged to collectively create a vision of a racially harmonious Germantown, and to think about what we need to get there.

The flyer is available from my website and I hope you will help me get the word out!

Susan, with thanks

Very good PDF about Computers

Wed, 19 May 2010 15:57:00 -0500

I was searching for a printed manual to give my digital literacy students and found this one

from the Boston Redevelopment Authority. Lovely pictures, clear text, it's a keeper!

10 Word Processing Products You Never Heard Of

Fri, 14 May 2010 12:33:00 -0500

Here's a link to the page that lists 10 FREE word processing products I've never heard of, but work great,especially if you can't afford to use Office.

10 FREE Word Processing Programs

A good blog to subscribe to

Fri, 14 May 2010 12:20:32 -0500

No, it's not about technology - it's about Mexican cooking!

I used to live in Patzcuaro, Michoacan, many years ago, and this woman's blog and photos brings back so many wonderful memories.

Like the time I was invited to a private home for luncheon. Very classical, very formal. I was an 18 year old hayseed from the Midwest. The maid served soup as our first course. It was a traditional soup I was told, made from potatoes and pasillas. It looked like a cream of potato soup garnished with spring asparagus. I dug in with relish, it smelled heavenly.

Pasillas I now know are the green form of a rather hot chile pepper!

How to easily split pages in Excel

Sun, 02 May 2010 11:51:57 -0500

The Computer Hope website this month offered a quick and easy tip on how to split Excel spreadsheet page so you can keep the top rows (labels) static, while you are scrolling down the sheet.

It can be difficult working with long Microsoft Excel spreadsheet documents and knowing what row or column you're working in when scrolled past the top row or far left column. To keep a row or column locked in place split the spreadsheet by moving the mouse cursor over the icon above the right scrollbar or to the right of the bottom scrollbar. Once positioned correctly your mouse cursor will turn into a double-arrowed cursor as shown in the picture to the right. Hold down your mouse and drag down or to the right until the document is split where needed.

How do I unsplit?

If you wish to remove this simply click-and-drag the split line back up to the top or far right of the spreadsheet until it vanishes and let go of the mouse button.

Good videos that explain well

Thu, 15 Apr 2010 14:12:00 -0500

CommonCraft makes really good videos that explain stuff well.

This is a link to their Computing section.

How to reorder your All Programs list

Thu, 15 Apr 2010 14:03:10 -0500

Whenever I visit client sites, I'm curious as to why they never sort their All Programs list in alphabetical order.

It's easy to do - here are the XP instructions (Windows 7 does this for you!):

Click Start, then All Programs, from anywhere in that list, on any icon, RIGHT-CLICK and choose Sort by Name.

It won't persist, meaning that as new programs are installed, they are not automatically sorted alphabetically, so every once in a while, just right-click and sort by name.

Cool Google Search tricks

Thu, 15 Apr 2010 13:21:53 -0500

A librarian friend of mine sent me the link to a site I had never visited, called Computer Hope.

Check it out, this is a good site, with help for hardware and software problems.

Another link on the site will get you a page of little known Search shortcuts Google Search tricks

A cool BMI and CR calculator

Tue, 06 Apr 2010 08:55:28 -0500

I've been interested in and researching the calorie restricted or anti-aging diet.

Found some good tools that anyone interested in nutrition can use, not use CRers.

This is a good BMI Calculator

And it's matching Calorie Restriction calculator

Here's what the website says about CR -
Calorie Restriction (CR) is a diet in which calorie intake is reduced, compared to diets that do not limit consumption, i.e., ad libitum (AL) diets. CR has been effective in extending the lifespan of many species through biochemical mechanisms that are still not well understood. Mice fed calorically restricted diets generally outlive mice fed AL diets by significant margins. It is not known yet whether CR will extend life on humans, but it is known that being slim, with a Body Mass Index around 21, reduces the incidence of diseases such as cancer, heart disease, and diabetes. Many people have already adopted CR diets to stay healthy and hoping to prolong their lives. To practice CR safely, it is necessary to select foods that provide all the nutritional requirements, but which are low in calories.

Basically, it's eating 20-40% less than you need to maintain your current weight. You lose about 1 lb. a week until you plateau at your low set point, or what you weighed when you were a junior in High School.

The really cool thing is that by eating fewer calories than needed to maintain your current weight (and this is a moving target obviously), your body switches gears, from fat-storing mode to system regeneration mode.

New version of Malwarebytes released!

Fri, 02 Apr 2010 10:15:00 -0500

It's way better than version 1.44, and it's available here:

Malwarebytes 1.45 Download Site

For my clients, this upgrade should auto-install, but will require a reboot, so if you see a message from Malwarebytes asking to reboot, please do so. (AVG Anti-virus requests this occasionally, too).

But after installing, everyone including my clients will need to schedule the scan and update jobs from the Malwarebytes application window.

If you need help with this, call or Email me.

How to use an ISO file

Tue, 30 Mar 2010 16:23:16 -0500

Do you have a netbook that does not have a CD ROM drive? Are you frustrated with trying to install ISO or image files?

I have 3 computers without CD drives and I spent today learning how to create a virtual CD ROM drive so I could install Office 2007 from an ISO file.

I ended up using CD Burner XP to burn an ISO image of Office 2007 to my flashdrive. That's the first thing you need to do, is create an ISO image on a flashdrive or on the hard drive of the computer without a CD Rom drive.

(This info is courtesy of Microsoft.com)

How do I download and use .ISO files?

Downloading .ISO files

There are 3 methods to download products as .ISO files:
1.   Use CD-R software to download an image file and write it to a blank CD-R or DVD-R. (This won't work for us, because if your computer is without a CD ROM drive, you can't insert the CD!)
2.   Open and copy .ISO image files to a local folder, much like ZIP files. (Note: This method would work.)
3.   Virtually mount and access .ISO files as a device. (Note: this is the method I chose to use.)

Writing .ISO files to CD-R or DVD-R

Most CD-R/DVD-R writing software includes a feature to create a disc from an image file.
Note: you must use the special "copy image to CD" or "burn image" functionality. See your software's Help for detailed information.

When you have burned the ISO to a CD, it may run on auto-play, you may have to navigate to the CD from My Computer and click on Setup. (Again, only if you have a CD burner in the computer you're trying to install to.)

Copying the contents of .ISO files to your hard drive

Contents of .ISO files may be accessed directly using third-party tools. This will allow you to extract files from an .ISO file to a temporary folder on your hard drive, and then run Setup.

The following tools offer such .ISO file support:
•   IsoBuster
•   CDmage
•   Daemon Tools

While other products can manipulate .ISO files and may work, they have not been tested. The products listed above have been known to work.

Mounting .ISO files virtually

The tool below is for Windows XP and allows .ISO files to be mounted virtually as CD-ROM/DVD-ROM devices. The link to this tool is provided for your convenience and is unsupported by Microsoft Product Support Services.

This is what I did then - created an ISO image on my flashdrive, installed a virtual CD drive to the computer without one, then mounted that drive, navigated to the ISO on my flashdrive and clicked Setup to install Office 2007. Cool, huh? Well, I guess you have to be there!

Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel for Windows XP

Here’s the Readme from the VCDRom tool:
Readme for Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel v2.0.1.1

THIS TOOL IS UNSUPPORT BY MICROSOFT PRODUCT SUPPORT SERVICES
System Requirements
===================
- Windows XP Home or Windows XP Professional
Installation instructions
=========================
1. Copy VCdRom.sys to your %systemroot%\system32\drivers folder.
2. Execute VCdControlTool.exe
3. Click "Driver control"
4. If the "Install Driver" button is available, click it. Navigate to the %systemroot%\system32\drivers folder, select VCdRom.sys, and click Open.
5. Click "Start"
6. Click OK
7. Click "Add Drive" to add a drive to the drive list. Ensure that the drive added is not a local drive. If it is, continue to click "Add Drive" until an unused drive letter is available.
8. Select an unused drive letter from the drive list and click "Mount".
9. Navigate to the image file, select it, and click "OK". UNC naming conventions should not be used, however mapped network drives should be OK.

You may now use the drive letter as if it were a local CD-ROM device. When you are finished you may unmount, stop, and remove the driver from memory using the driver control.

Another Rinker Rock recipe - "Sunny Tom" Salad Dressing

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 17:28:11 -0600

My all time favorite salad dressing, from a Bellaire, TX restaurant.

This recipe makes a luscious, deeply red, glossy, tangy dressing for greens or pasta salad or even a BBQ sandwich.

1 c. sundried tomatoes (in oil or soaked dried)

3/4 c. brown sugar

1 c. balsamic vinegar

2 c. olive oil

Process the sun-dried tomatoes and brown sugar. Add the balsamic vinegar, process again. Pour mixture into large glass jar, add 2 c. olive oil, and shake well.

Obviously, the better your sun-dried tomatoes, vinegar and oil, the better the dressing. We served this dressing on mixed greens, with feta cheese.

Watch these videos and learn how to make GREAT PowerPoint Presentations

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 11:36:09 -0600

Watch one or all three and turn your boring, bulleted, too wordy PowerPoint slides into audience-grabbing shows that will generate oohs and ahhs, even applause.

My mentor, Bob Lane, has some really cool Relational PowerPoint videos on his website.

This method, called Relational Presentation, lets you organize and connect to all your slides, from any presentation, in two clicks.

I've built some for my computer training work, email me if you want to see it in action.

Download Quick Guides from my site

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 11:54:21 -0600

I just posted a new webpage with download links to several popular Quick Reference Guides, or QRGs.

Download them, save and print, and keep the two page documents by your computer.

They show you the basic features and how to use the application plus the most common shortcuts.

If you need others, QRGs Please and I will send them to you.