In this article, I want to talk a little bit about two computer terms that I see people confusing or demonstrating that they don’t understand completely.  People often use the two interchangeably or consistently use the wrong one. These two terms are “cancel” and “delete.”

Let’s start with “delete.” To delete something is the process of taking something such as a file, like a Word document or photograph, and removing it.

The process generally involves moving it to the trash on a Mac or the recycle bin on a Windows machine and emptying the trash or recycle bin. The emptying part is what is actually deleting it.

When you delete a file, in most cases for most people, it’s gone. Technically, it’s still there but has been marked as available space on the drive — think of painting over a mark on a wall — it’s hidden but not technically gone.

Whatever space the file that has been deleted was taking up is marked as available. Until some other file comes along and is saved in that spot, or part of that same spot, the file is technically available and can be recovered with the right program.

However, as far as most people are concerned, once the recycle bin or trash is emptied, the file is gone for good. Until you empty it, it’s still available for you to pull back out and retrieve.

Another example of how to use the word “delete” correctly is when you delete not a file, but text.  For example, if I decided I didn’t want this specific sentence in this article anymore, I’d delete it with the “delete” or “backspace” key on my keyboard.  Again, as with deleting a file, this is the process of removing something.

In most writing programs (including word processing programs such as Microsoft Word, or email programs such as Mozilla Thunderbird, etc.) you can restore words you’ve deleted if you use “undo” to reverse the last thing you did.

Some programs may let you undo more than once, stepping back through each change you made, but in most or all cases once you close the program, any words you’ve deleted from your document are gone for good unless you’ve saved them in a different file.

What I see people doing sometimes is use the term “cancel” or “delete” inappropriately. Deleting is the process of taking information on a computer and getting rid of it. It is not the process of closing a window.

I have seen a lot of people refer to closing a window or getting rid of an error message that has come up as “deleting” it. That’s not deleting. If you close a window, you’re simply closing a window.

I’ve also seen people refer to closing a window as canceling. I’ve also seen people refer to deleting an item as canceling it. That’s not the correct terminology.

Canceling is when you have a process that has been started and you “cancel” that process. You stop it from continuing, or interrupt it in other words.  It takes you back to where you were immediately before the process.

What do I mean by that? Let me give you an example. Let’s say you in a word processor, like Microsoft Word. You’ve written something, and then you close the program without saving.

What’s going to happen? Traditionally, the program will pop up a window or dialog box that presents you with some options. It will say something along the lines of, “You’re trying to close, and you haven’t saved yet. Would you like to save, cancel or continue without saving?”

The wording does vary from one program to the next, but something along those lines is what you might see in the situation where you’re trying to close without having saved yet.

Let’s just say the phrasing is, “Do you want to save the changes you made? Your changes will be lost if you don’t save them.” Then you’re presented with three buttons: don’t save, cancel and save.

What would happen in this situation if you tried these different buttons?

If you don’t save, it will simply close the program or window without saving it, and you will lose whatever work you’ve done since the last time you saved. If you click save, it will save the file, and probably ask you for a file name if you haven’t saved it before.

The other option is to cancel. Cancel would cancel the process of closing and take you right back to where you were before you started to close the window.

At that point you could continue writing, you could save and close or you could decide you’re going to close anyway and that you don’t care about saving. Then it would present you with the same three options, and you would be able to hit “don’t save.”

What I’m trying to say here is that if you are presented with a cancel option, it doesn’t mean it’s going to delete anything.

It just means that whatever process you’re in the middle of, in our example exiting a program, it interrupts that. It takes you right back to where you were immediately before that.

It’s not correct to refer to closing a window as canceling it. It’s not correct to refer to deleting a file as canceling it. Canceling only applies to a situation where you’ve started a process (a series of automated steps) which you have the option of cancelling before all the steps are completed.

If you want to get technical, if you hit the cancel button, it does close the little window with the question in it (the little window with the question in it is referred to as a “dialogue box” because it’s asking a question and waiting for a response — trying to have a dialogue with you).

This is probably where the confusion comes from for a lot of people. Closing the window is not correctly referred to as canceling even if sometimes canceling something will close a window.

I hope that makes sense. I know it’s a little confusing sometimes because you see these words out of context, and you don’t fully understand how they work and relate to each other.

I hope that makes some sense and will help you use those computer terms more accurately in the future so you can recognize and understand what people are saying when they’re using them correctly around you in the future as well.

What you’ve just read is an edited transcription of one of an audio lesson I recorded some time ago.  If you like to study written material to learn computers, you might check out my selection of computer training books on Amazon.com or if you prefer a visual approach you might want to check out my easy video lesson computer courses including the Mac Basics course and the PC Basics course here on my site.

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

This question was asked by Paul Prior. Paul wrote saying, “Out of curiosity, after updates I get a message saying to restart my computer, which I always do. What’s the reason for this?”

Transcription begins:

This is a pretty simple thing to understand when you think about it the right way.

First off, the updates he’s talking about are Windows updates, or software updates as they’re called on the Mac. These are fixes and improvements that have been issued by Microsoft, in the case of Windows, or, in the case of Mac OS X, by Apple.

Generally, on the Windows side, they’re almost exclusively fixes for problems. On the Mac side, they are maybe 50% to 75% fixes for problems, and 25% to 50% are actually improvements and enhancements they’ve added in.

You want to do these updates pretty much any time they come out, especially on the Windows side. It’s not just on the Windows side. I should be fair. Any time there’s a security update on the Mac or Windows side, you always want to do that as soon as you can. Most updates are security updates on the Windows side, generally speaking.

It’s never a bad idea to do a backup first just in case. Occasionally, some people will have problems with these updates. It’s a minority, but some people have run into problems. As a precaution, it’s a good idea to do a backup first.

Doing the updates is a really important thing to do because it fixes problems and security issues. If they’re not fixed, they can cause your computer to get invaded by a hacker, malicious program or what have you. You don’t want to have that happen.
By doing the updates, in many cases, the computer has to restart. Paul was wondering why this is.

Think of it this way. The files on your computer are like a rug. If you’re standing on a rug, can you take that rug, pick it up and clean it? Probably not because you’re standing on it. It’s in use. Files are much the same. If a file is in use, it can’t be picked up and replaced with a new version of the file just as you could not replace the rug with a new rug until you get everything off of it.

Essentially, what happens when you restart the computer after the update is it’s getting all the stuff off the rugs, picking the rugs up and replacing them with new rugs, so to speak. That’s why you have to restart the computer after you do an update.
Basically, it’s just a matter of getting out of the way of the files so they’re not in use and they can be replaced.

Hopefully that makes sense and answers your question.

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

Computer users have a wide range of experience and levels of understanding of their computers. The great majority of users have just learned the most basic features of a few of the thousands of programs out there. It really can be a help for you to learn computer basics that you may have been taught.

But that’s nothing to be ashamed of — even the most advanced computer user was at that level at some point, myself included. Even if you’re just using your computer for word processing, learning a few simple skills can make your life a lot easier.

• First and foremost: save often!    If you type a long letter, or make a lot of changes to whatever you’re working on, and the power goes out or something else happens, you could lose everything you haven’t saved!Just imagine how upset you would be if you’d worked on something for half an hour, an hour, or longer, and *poof* it vanished.Just going to the File menu and clicking save can help you avoid losing all that work.
• Save as new versions periodically:   If you’re working on a large project — such as a story or essay, where you write multiple drafts — periodically use the “save as” option from the File menu to save your file with a new name.That way if the third draft had something good you deleted in the fourth draft, you can bring it back for the fifth.For example, if you’re working on a file called My Letter.doc and you’ve made a lot of changes since your last save, go to “save as…” from the File menu, and change the name to My Letter2.doc.This way, you have both versions.
• Remember you can click anywhere in the document with your mouse and make changes wherever you place the cursor (the blinking vertical line which indicates where what you type next will appear).So if you realize you’ve made a mistake two lines back, just click where you want to make the change instead of deleting everything back to the mistake, then retyping it all. When you’re done, just click at the bottom and pick up where you left off.
• Cutting, Copying & pasting:   If you want to move a word, a sentence, a paragraph, or even a page of text, you can cut it and paste it someplace else in the document.To do this, just highlight the section of text you want by dragging your mouse (click and hold the left button, then drag) across the text. You’ll see a highlight appear where you drag.Let go of the mouse button then go to the edit menu.In the edit menu you can select “copy” to make a copy of the text, or “cut” to remove the text that is highlighted.Then go to the part of the document where you want to move or copy the text and click there so the cursor appears where you want your text to appear.

  Go back to the edit menu and select paste.Your text will appear where you clicked.You can use this to move text around in a document, or copy and paste it into an other document or even an email, and vice versa. Copying and pasting also can work with graphics or even files and folders in some situations.

• Undo: if you make a mistake the “undo” option in the Edit menu will allow you to undo the last thing you did. Accidentally highlighted and deleted a paragraph in that letter?Just undo before you type anything else and it comes right back.  Like all of the skills I’m talking about in this article, you can undo in Microsoft Windows, and you can undo in Mac OS X
• Learn the common keyboard shortcuts which work in most applications:
  On Windows PCs, the common keyboard shortcuts include: CTRL-S to save, CTRL-C to copy, CTRL-X to cut, CTRL-V to paste. ALT-F4 will close a window or program (or prompt you to shut down Windows if you are not in a program).On a Macintosh computer, common keyboard shortcuts include: Command-S to save, Command-C to copy, Command-X to cut, Command-V to paste. Command-W will close a window, and Command-Q will quit the program you’re in.

  In all cases, these key combinations are done as follows: hold down CTRL (or Command), type the other key, and release both. Just like using the shift key to type a capital letter. On both Macs and PCs, these and additional shortcuts are typically printed in the menus next to the option.

These are just a few computer basics that can really make your life easier.

For more help, including easy video lessons, check out my computer courses or my new computer training app for iPhone and iPad.

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

I thought I’d share the following infrographic (Image courtesy of HackCollege) which gives you tips on how to use Google and other search engines more effectively.

The guide has a bunch of good tips, many of which I share in my related video lessons in my Easy Internet course (see links below image). 

I do have to mention that I disagree with one part of the information below: they say never to google questions, but that CAN be useful sometimes.

The times you want to type questions into a search engine is when you’re looking for a forum or discussion where someone has asked the same question that you have — you will often find your question has been answered in the discussion!

So while they’re right that you don’t need to phrase your searches as questions, it can be helpful sometimes.

The guide is written with students in mind — it turns out about 75% of students have no idea how to use Google properly — but has tips most computer users will find useful.

Something else to keep in mind: if 3/4ths of college students, all of whom grew up using computers, don’t know how to use a search engine correctly, it kind of puts to rest the stereotype that “all young people know how to use computers”.

I mention this because many of my older students who grew up before home computers were widespread (or before they even existed) often think they’ll never learn to use the computer as well as their kids or grandkids because of this.

The fact is, from what I’ve seen, the majority of people do not really know how to use their computer that well, regardless of age.

This isn’t a criticism, just a simple fact. People who grew up with computers have the benefit of feeling more comfortable using them, but that doesn’t make them any better automatically.

It can help because they have fewer limiting beliefs about their ability to learn, which can make a big difference, but it can actually make things worse because it’s very common for those people to assume they know far more than they do.

Take a look at the infographic (instructional image) below and see what tips you can learn about how to use Google to search more effectively:

[The image below is very large; if it doesn't load try clicking here to view it]

You can learn more tips to use the search engines correctly, browse more easily and more safely, all explained visually with my easy video lessons in Plain English. Just use one of the following links:

How to Use the Internet for Microsoft Windows

or

How to Use the Internet for Apple Mac

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

In this audio lesson & transcript, I’m going to take a question from Mark. He writes and asks, “What’s a flash drive?”

Transcript of computer lesson begins:
A flash drive is a type of storage device for a computer. A storage device is the broad or general term for anything that is used to store data or files.

A hard drive in your computer is a storage device. An old floppy disk is a storage device. A CD-ROM or DVD is a storage device, and so is a flash drive.

A lot of people call flash drives by specific brand names. They think that is the correct name for them. Sometimes they’ll refer to them as a thumb drive, jump drive, go drive, key drive or any number of things. These are actually all brand names or partial brand names that people have mistakenly thought was the correct general term for that type of device.

A flash drive is a little piece of solid state storage. That means there are no moving parts. From the outside, it looks basically like a uniform block.

If you dig inside of it, there’s what’s referred to as a disk, but it’s not a disk shape, unlike a hard drive. Inside of a hard drive, there is a physical disk that looks like a disk. Even with floppy disks, I’ve heard people over the years say they aren’t disks. Technically they are. It’s square on the outside, but if you rip open an old floppy disk, you’ll find a disk inside. It would actually flop. It’s not rigid.

Basically, a flash drive uses something called flash memory. That’s solid state, so there are no physical moving parts unlike with a hard drive. That has a physical disk, like I mentioned, which spins much like an old record or a CD does when it’s playing.

That has a little thing called a read/write head that moves around and reads information from the disk and writes information to the disk. There are a lot of physical moving parts.
That uses more electricity than something that’s solid state. It also usually takes up more space than something that’s solid state. The big advantage of flash memory is that it’s very small and lightweight, and it doesn’t use much power.

You get these little devices that can store an increasing amount of information, or data, on them. They only take up a very small amount of room.

Any mobile device like an iPhone or any smartphone typically has some kind of flash memory in it. It wouldn’t make any sense to try to put a miniature hard drive in them. While there are hard drives that could fit in there, it would use way more battery power and run the battery down really fast.

There’s also an increased chance of damage to the disk and loss of files by impact. One of the liabilities of the hard drive is that because it has spinning and moving parts, if something hits it or it gets dropped, it can damage the drive, and you can lose files.

There are safeguards in modern hard drives that make it so they very rapidly will stop the disk spinning to minimize the risk of that damage, but it’s still one of the downsides of them and one of the reasons they’re not used in mobile devices.

The big advantage with flash drives is that they’re very small, light and portable.

In terms of dollar per megabyte or dollar per gigabyte, they are significantly more expensive than hard drives. The difference in price is getting less and less as time goes by, and you’re getting more and more storage space on these little flash drives.

I remember probably in 2002, I spent something close to $400 on a 1 gigabyte flash drive. These days in 2011, not a decade on from them but getting close, I don’t think you can even get a 1 gigabyte flash drive because it’s such a small amount.

The smallest amount you can get is at least 8 gigabytes. I’m not sure. I haven’t looked at this recently. It may be 16 gigabytes by this point. You can get that for a few dollars. That’s just how it is. It’s pretty crazy, but that’s a pretty typical thing with computers.

I hope that makes sense. It’s basically another method of storing files. Typically, you can just plug flash drives into a USB port on your computer and drag and drop files. You’ll be able to then unplug it, plug it into another computer, and it’s a way of transferring files back and forth. It also is a way you can back up your files to make a spare copy of them to protect them.

That’s pretty much what a flash drive is.

You might have heard of them as jump drives, thumb drives, go drives or what have you, but those are all examples of flash drives. It’s not, in other words, the generic term for a flash drive.

Basically, that’s what a flash drive is. It’s a small storage device that’s easily carried around. You can put it in your pocket, plug it in, move files on and off a computer, unplug it, and put it back in your pocket. I hope that makes sense.

You can learn more about USB flash drives and how to use them on these easy video lesson courses:

• How to Back Up Your Mac
• How to Back Up Your Windows Computer
• Apple Mac Basics Course
• Microsoft Windows Basics Course

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

Video Lesson Transcription Begins Here:


I want to explain the computer term “video card.” I’m answering a newsletter subscriber’s question about what a video card is. I’m going to explain to you what a video card is and what it basically does. I’m also going to give you a few suggestions on choosing the right video card for your computer.

I will not be going into specific makes and models of video cards because things change very rapidly. One of the fastest changing components in a computer is the video card because computers are putting greater and greater demands on it. Anything I could talk about that is specific to a particular make or model will be obsolete soon, so I’m not even going to get into that.

What I will do is give you the general ideas and principles that will always apply.

A video card is a piece of hardware. Hardware is the physical part to your computer, as opposed to software which is the nonphysical, intangible part of the computer.

A simple way I like to explain it is that hardware is like your brain, the physical part in your head that thinks. Software is like the thoughts in the brain. You can’t touch thoughts, but they’re there nonetheless and they make a difference.

In many cases, you have a video card that is a separate card. It’s thin and rectangular-shaped. It goes into a slot inside your computer. In other cases, you have what’s called an “integrated video card,” or it’s built into the motherboard or main logic board of the computer.

The ones that have integrated video or built-in video are usually not the best quality, and you won’t get the best performance out of the computer. There are a few reasons for this.

The video cards that are integrated are usually low-end video cards to begin with. It’s not always the case. Apple puts integrated video cards into their computers in a lot of cases, but depending on the make and model, they may or may not be a lower-end one.

That’s a generalization, but most of the time if you’re talking about a Windows computer with an integrated video card, it is a lower-end card and you’re potentially going to be sacrificing a little bit in performance. Part of this is because the video card itself is not the most powerful in the world.

Other times, it’s because the video card, which uses memory, borrows the main memory from the computer, so you can lose a quarter or more of your actual memory that it says on the box or label. You end up sacrificing a good chunk of it, so you don’t really get as much memory as you think you have or as much as the salesperson said if it’s an integrated video card.

All a video card really does is take the picture and put it on the screen. If you’re watching this on a computer, which I assume you probably are, it has a video card. You could be on an iPhone or something, and these have integrated video cards in them too.

It’s the same basic principle. The video card just takes the picture and puts it on the screen. It’s not just moving video but also all the desktop icons, your menu bars and so forth.

Then you have the higher-end cards. The cards that slot in separately are generally on a Windows computer because on the Apple side, they have integrated cards with most of the computers. Usually, they’re a little bit better quality than the integrated ones, or in some cases, a lot better quality than the integrated ones that you find on Windows computers.

The high-end Mac Pros do have separate cards that slot in. That’s partially because the cards that go in tend to be more beefy, robust or powerful than the integrated cards.

There is still a fairly wide range of quality. You have very cheap video cards and very high-end ones. Which one do you want to get? That’s a good question.

Again, with any of the ones that Apple is selling with their computers, you can fairly safely assume that it is going to be more than capable of handling the basic stuff that most people, the average computer users, are going to do. They don’t tend to put in cut-rate equipment.

On the Windows side of things, with a lot of the different brand names out there, this is not always the case. The low-end cards often make a fairly big sacrifice, especially if you’re running a newer version of Windows, like Windows Vista. It should be better with Windows 7, which is still forthcoming. Windows Vista does a lot better with a high-end video card.

You don’t need the highest high-end machine, but it’s helpful to have something other than the cheapest, least expensive, least powerful card. Something in the mid-range should be fine.

Who needs a really high-end video card? Someone who is going to be playing high-end games on the computer needs one. I don’t mean Solitaire. I mean a fast-paced, very complex, animated, fast-moving game with computer-generated images.

The games like first-person-perspective shooter games where you’re running around playing in a hostile environment tend to work better if they have a high-end video card. They’re going to look better. They will perform better. It’s not going to be slow. Someone who is a high-end gamer, of course, wants a high-end video card.

Generally speaking, if you play the latest, greatest games, you want to get the best video card you can possibly put in your computer. That’s the bottom line.

For someone who’s doing fairly high-end stuff with graphics or video editing, it doesn’t always make a big difference to have a high-end video card, but it can help. Someone who is doing CAD work or an architect perhaps might benefit from having a higher-end video card. They probably don’t need the highest end in the world, but it never hurts.

That’s basically what I want to cover. I can’t give you really specific advice about a particular make or model card because it gets outdated almost immediately.

The basic principle is that a video card is just a part of the computer. It’s a piece of hardware.

It puts the picture up on the screen and lets you hook your screen up. In the case of iMac or a laptop, it’s built in and internally hooked up to that video card, but you still have the screen hooked up to a card. Even something like a phone has a video card of sorts in it, and the screen is hooked up to it.

That’s what I wanted to cover in this lesson.

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

I’ve been helping make computers easy for people for about 16 years now as a professional, but have been an avid computer user for well over a quarter century at this point.

There are a lot of people who think computers are hard to use, and need my help to make heads or tails
of them.

It’s not your fault if you feel this way, but I wanted to give you a quick “computer history” lesson to help you understand that computers are in most ways *much* easier than when I started using them, and to help you understand they’re only getting easier as time goes by.

I also wanted to share a website with you that lets you look into the Internet of the past to see what it was like before the days of the World Wide Web – what I used to use back in the day before most people had even heard of email.

When I got my first computer back in the 1980s, it didn’t come with a modem. I had to spend hundreds of dollars to buy a dialup modem which ran at “1200 bps” – that number may not mean anything to you, but in relative terms compared to a modern cable or DSL modem it was like walking compared to driving a fast car at top speed.

VERY slow!

Not only was it slow, it was a “dumb modem” which meant that every single time I used it I had to manually configure it to work properly, something I had to do by memorizing and typing in a string of letters and numbers that would look like gibberish to most people.

Once I was connected to the Internet I didn’t have bookmarks or search engines to find things, I had to
know the exact address of a site I wanted to connect to, then type another special command to connect to it.

Everything was done by typing commands and you often needed to have a great deal of knowledge about exactly how your computer worked “under the hood” to know the correct commands to type, and if you typed one letter or number wrong it just wouldn’t work!

A far cry from today where you can grab a mouse and double-click on an icon and then from there click a link or a button to get where you want, or at most type in what you’re looking for in a search engine.

If you want to get an idea of what it used to look like back in the day, there’s a website which simulates the Internet as it was about 20 years ago before the Web came along, when just about the only people using the Internet were complete computer geeks like myself.

Go to: http://telehack.com/

and you’ll see what it was like. You have to type commands to get around (a list of commands is shown
when you arrive) followed by the Enter or Return key to “send” the command.

I’m just sharing this with you for fun, and to give you a little perspective on how things have changed. The good news is, things are generally getting easier as time goes by.

On the down side, of course, we do face a lot more potential threats and risks to our privacy and security
on the modern Internet than was around back then.

In my next email I’ll tell you about one type of threat that can put you at risk no matter what kind of
computer you use (yes, including Apple Macs).

Fortunately, this particular threat is one that can be defeated by knowledge, and I’ll share a new lesson
to give you that knowledge so you can stay safe.

So keep an eye out for that lesson – I’ll be posting it in the next few days.

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

Here is one of my early video lessons (please excuse the video quality) where I use one of my Plain English explanations of computer terms — explaining what a hard drive is and what RAM is, and what they do in your computer.  Many people confuse those two terms with each other, and many people don’t understand either at all.

If this is true for you, it’s not your fault — it’s just never been explained to you in a way that you could relate to. Watch this video and both computer terms will finally make sense, even if you feel like the most basic computer user in the world:

If you need help understanding computer basics and mastering the fundamental computer skills, look no further than my Computer Basics Course, available for either Windows or Apple Mac computers:

Microsoft Windows Basic Computer Skills

or

Apple Mac Basic Computer Skills

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

Here is a simple thing to learn but is a big time saver you really need to know about when using the Internet.

I see many rookie, and even experienced computer users making this blunder (and remember, I’m not being critical; it’s not your fault if you’re making this computer mistake)

Don’t use a search engine like Google or Bing to search for web pages or web sites if you already know the address!

Search engines are like phone books. A lot of people don’t use them at all anymore, but when woukd you use one? You’d use one to look up a number if you don’t know it, right?

You don’t use a phone book when you already know the number, because that would be a waste of time and wouldn’t make sense, right?

But that’s exactly the mistake I’ve seen people making again and again over the many years I’ve helped people with their computers.

So for example, in my computer newsletter I may send out a link to a lesson on my site. Now normally you should be able to click on, but sometimes email programs will “break” the link so clicking it doesn’t work.

So what some people do is they try typing the address of the link into a search engine, and end up not being able to find the page!

That’s because the page in the example is for my subscribers only, and so is an “unlisted number” (so to speak) which isn’t listed in Google or any other search engines, just like an unlisted number isn’t found in the phone book.

Make sense?

So how do you “directly dial the number” of a web page you know?

Simple. In your web browser window (a web browser is the program you use to look at web pages, such as Safari, Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, or Internet Explorer) at the top of the window you should normally see a bar with the address of the website you are currently viewing.

So if you are on Amazon you’d see

http://www.amazon.com/

or if you’re using Google you’d see:

http://www.google.com/

etc.  In most cases you’d actually see something longer, but it will always begin with the “domain name” of the website.

That bar where you see the address of the site is called the location bar, or the address bar.

All you need to do to go to a website you know the address of, whether it’s a public page a private page, is to click ONCE on the address bar and typically this will “highlight” that address.

You can then either hit the delete or backspace key on your keyboard to clear it, or usually you can simply start typing and everything that is highlighted in blue will be replaced by what you’re typing.

So if you wanted to go to Facebook, you could type

http://www.facebook.com/

into that address bar and press Enter or Return on your keyboard and it would take you directly there.

You could also just type

facebook.com

and that would work too because the first part is almost always optional.

This is much better than *searching* for an address, finding it in the search results (or maybe not even finding it at all). Then clicking the link in the search results to get there, when you could just dial direct.

Even if it’s a public page that is listed, at the very least you’ve wasted time and effort searching for something you don’t need to search for, because you already know where it is.

Again, this is like using a phone book to look up a number you already know — and if it’s a private, unlisted web page, like the ones I share with my newsletter, it won’t even turn up.

Personally, the only time I type the address of a website into a search engine and search for it is when I’m trying to learn more *about* the site, rather than searching to get there.

So learn this basic computer tip:

If you know an address of a website, just type it into the address bar at the top of your web browser window and press the enter key on your keyboard.

Do not search for it as you are at best wasting time and effort, and at worst will not get where you’re trying to go.

I hope that helps.

Since I’ve seen so many people making this mistake over the years, I made a point of including an easy step-by-step video lesson on exactly what I talked about in this article as one of the first lessons on my “Safe & Easy Internet” course.

You can learn more tips to use the search engines correctly, browse more easily and more safely, all explained visually with my easy video lessons in Plain English. Just use one of the following links:

How to Use the Internet for Microsoft Windows

or

How to Use the Internet for Apple Mac

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

In this video lesson I explain the two general methods of backing up your important files, namely incremental backup (a.k.a. versioned backup) and “cloning” backup.

I also give specific suggestions about how to do either one or both to protect the important files on your computer. Failing to back up is perhaps the biggest single computer mistake I see people making, and failing to back up correctly and regularly can lead to the loss of time, money and irreplaceable files, which can have devastating consequences.

Watch and learn how to protect yourself.

This video appears as part of my course on how to back up. To learn more, use one of the following links:

How to Backup – Apple Mac

or

How to Backup – Windows (XP, Vista & 7)

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

In this computer question & answer audio lesson I’m taking a question from user brandang17 who asks:
“So because I have wireless internet an stuff with my phone when I turn WiFi on does that mean I am getting free Internet or am I still paying for it though my plan? Thank you”

Use the player to listen to the audio computer lesson where I’ll not just answer the question “Is WiFi free?” but give my usual Plain English explanation of what I’m talking about so everyone can understand the answer, even non-technical people.

Bottom line is, someone always has to pay for an Internet connection somewhere along the line, so whether you’re using a computer or a mobile device like a smartphone it’s not “free” even if you’re not paying to use the wireless signal. And while using WiFi on your phone may not count against any monthly limits on data that your phone plan offers, it doesn’t mean you won’t get charged the regular monthly fee for phone data (Internet) connections.

You may be able to cancel the data part of your phone service, depending on the details of your contract, however. If you do, keep in mind you’ll be limited to *only* using WiFi signals and so will be much more limited about where you can go online with your phone.

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

In this video computer lesson I want to share some tips to help you understand how forms work (including order forms, surveys, newsletter signup forms, etc.).  This covers a lot of fundamentals that more basic computer users often need help with, but also includes tips for how you can use your keyboard and mouse together to navigate more easily and save time and effort — using simple steps that even experienced computer users often aren’t aware of!

In the video I use the order form on my website as an example, but the same principles work on most forms you’ll ever have to fill out on a computer — whether you’re talking about a form on a website, or a form in a program stored locally on your computer which has nothing to do with the Internet.

This lesson will be added as part of a new disc in the updated version of the Safe & Easy Internet computer course (both the Windows and the Mac version). The site doesn’t list it yet, but any orders will include the new disc.

(If you’re watching this video lesson on my website, you should see two players below for compatibility reasons. The first should give you a sharper picture & the option of full-screen on a computer, the second is for mobile devices such as the iPod Touch, iPhone & iPad, and for that reason is the version which goes out on the podcast.)

Click the player below for the high quality computer version:

or tap the image below for the version of  the video lesson formatted for mobile devices:

“Discover How to Use the Internet Safely & Easily With Simple,
Step-By-Step Video Lessons”

Wish you had a complete course to make it easier using the Internet,
from finding what you’re looking for when searching online, to tips
to save time and make you safer? Use one of the two links below for
either the Windows version or the Mac version of the Safe & Easy
Internet course:

How to Use the Internet Apple Mac Course

or

How to Use the Internet Windows PC Course

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

The following article is an except from Worth’s new book titled “How to Avoid 7 Common & Costly Computer Mistakes – Explained in Plain English”.

Why Back Up?

I’ve seen it over and over again in the many years I’ve been helping people with computers: people – both at home and at work – who never back up their files.

This is a really bad idea, and if you’re guilty of this, I suggest you make a point to start regularly backing up your files.

Let me explain why.

As you may know, every file on your computer – from photos, to music, to email, all of your programs, and even Windows itself, or Mac OS X – everything is stored on a part of the computer called the hard drive.

Hard drives (both the older mechanical ones and the newer “solid state drives” a.k.a. SSDs) are the best technology available to us right now to store files on a computer, but unfortunately they can break down for a lot of reasons. Because of this, pretty much every hard drive will fail eventually.

Anything in a computer, of course, can break down, but the hard drive is one of the most common parts to go.

When this happens, chances are some, if not all of the files on the drive will be lost. Unfortunately most people learn this lesson the hard way, myself included!

Years ago, when I was fresh out of high school, I still owned my first computer which was a few years old by that point. One day I was using my computer when I started hearing a clicking noise from inside the case, and suddenly couldn’t open any of my files — my computer’s hard drive was breaking down!

I quickly realized what was going on and started copying my files as fast as I could to floppy disks (it was around 1990 when this happened).

Hours later, after I don’t know how many floppies, and after hitting “retry” over and over and over, I managed to scrape maybe half of my important files off the drive before it completely fell apart.

I was devastated: I’d lost so much of my early writing (short stories I wrote for myself, plus school work, letters, etc.) and a bunch of other important files that represented years of work.

Imagine the most important things you keep on your computer. I don’t know if this would be your favorite memories in the form of pictures or home videos, important writing, like business or personal emails or Word documents, critical financial records – imagine what it would feel like to watch all of those irreplaceable things just go up in smoke right before your eyes.

I’m a writer, and I lost at least half of my early writing, which I still miss sometimes, over 20 years later!

And I was lucky!

I have seen so many people bring their computers to me with a failing or dead hard drive. I’ve worked on their computers and in some cases I was able to get their files, but a lot of times it was just too late.

They lost everything.

And people don’t lose files just because of hard drives going bad as a natural result of years of use!

Other times, people lose files due to viruses, careless mistakes by someone using the computer who accidentally erases something important, or due to clumsy mistakes such as spilling a liquid onto the computer and frying the hard drive in the process.

The results can be stressful and upsetting if this happens on a personal computer, but it can be fatal to a business: according to the Gartner Group, a major IT research company, the estimate is that “43 percent of businesses fail… following a major disaster and 29 percent fail within the first two to four months.”

Believe me, for a business – and for a lot of home users who keep their tax records, loan info, and other critical financial information on their computer – losing your files can truly be a major disaster.

But it’s so easy to avoid.

If all those people had just taken a few minutes to back up their files on a regular basis, at worst they would’ve lost a few days’ worth of work, or as little as a few hours – however long it was since their last backup!

Now that I’ve explained why back up your computer, do yourself a huge favor and get in the habit of backing up regularly. It’s not hard or time consuming and is well worth it.

It’s almost inevitable that something will go wrong that can cause lost files. Better to be prepared and keep your files than to make the mistake of failing to back up and losing everything as a result.

If you need more help, take a look at my easy video lesson course on backing up your computer, available for either Mac or Windows computers:

How to Back Up – Apple Mac

How to Back Up – Windows PC

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

Have you ever been stuck in traffic behind a car with one of those custom license plates like “LUVYZ1″ and you’re scratching your head for a couple of minutes trying to figure out what on Earth it’s supposed to mean?

I was doing that earlier today on my way home and it made me think of a computer tip I thought I’d share with you to make your computer more organized and easier to use.

Back in the day when I first got into computers, the names of files on your computer were a lot like custom car license plates: you had a very limited amount of space to name the file and so you were forced to come up with weird
abbreviations just like you see on license plates.

To this day I still have a few really old Word files which have names such as “MITYLIKE.DOC” where I had to try to describe what the file was in the 8 characters I was given to do so. (If you’re not sure what I mean by “characters”, that’s the term that includes letters, numbers, and punctuation)

If you’re wondering, the above example is a short story I wrote in 1990 or so which was inspired by The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, a classic short story written by James Thurber which also made into a film starring Danny Kaye.

Knowing that, you can see why I named the file MITYLIKE, and can probably also see why I wished I could’ve given it a longer and more descriptive name?

So what does this have to do with make your computer more organized and easier you might be wondering?

Well, something I’ve noticed over the many years I’ve been helping people with their computers is that most people don’t take advantage of the ability to use descriptive file names, and they’re making things harder on themselves as a result.

Now this is no criticism at all if you’re making this computer mistake yourself, but that’s why I’m writing this to help you.

You see, in the 1990s, the maximum length for file names went up a lot from the old 8 character name plus 3 character extension for DOS or Windows PCs, and the 31 character limit older Apple Mac computers had to a total of 255 characters.

(The “extension” is the end part after the dot, such as .DOC which is used to tell the computer what type of file it is, such as a Word DOCument.)

These “long file names” give you the ability to give useful & descriptive file names which can make your life easier when organizing and locating files.

You can name (or rename) a file by clicking once on the name of the file (not the icon!) pausing a moment, then clicking again and you should see the name get highlighted.

Note: this is *not* the same as double-clicking the file name. This is a single click, a short pause, then a second single click with the left button on your mouse.

You can then type in a nice long descriptive file name such as “Unnamed short story inspired by “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.doc”, which I’m sure you’ll agree is much easier to recognize than “MITYLIKE.DOC”!

And don’t worry about counting the letters in the name while you’re typing; your computer won’t let you type any more than you’re allowed.

I also suggest you might put a date or maybe a version number into the file name, especially if you keep different drafts of a document.  If you do this you’ll want to write the date something like 7-7-2011 rather than 7/7/2011 as the / character is not allowed on Windows PCs (and I recommend this for Mac users too to make the name more compatible in case you ever send it to a Windows computer).

One last thing is, as I mentioned above, the extension (such as .doc) is there for a reason and you should leave that part as-is.  Many newer computers will automatically help you avoid accidentally changing that part of the file name, but not all do.

By taking advantage of the long filenames allowed by modern computers, you can help yourself more easily recognize what a file is, and it can help turn up the file you’re looking for if you do a search on your computer for information you’re needing, that photo you want to look at, and so on.

Hopefully these tips will help you get more out of your computer and make your life a little easier. I’ve used these suggestions myself for many years now and and very glad that I did. Really has made my life easier on many occasion.

Remember, if you do need more help with this, I show you step-by-step how to do all of this and much more on my computer basics video lesson CDs.

If you don’t already have these CDs, they are video recordings of the actual screens of the computer where you get to see each click of the mouse and sit back and watch every step while my voice comes from your computer’s speakers, walking you through the entire thing in simple Plain English.

While each easy lesson CD has an hour of material, individual lessons are 30 minutes or less, with most being just 5-15 minutes long so it’s easy to learn at your own pace.

You can find out more on my site and even place a secure order if you want by using one of the following two links:

Fundamental Windows Computer Skills – Training CDs

or

Fundamental Apple Mac Computer Skills – Training CDs

Either way, until next time, take care, and enjoy,

Worth Godwin
Plain English Simplicity For This Complex Modern World

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

The intro before the step-by-step part of the video is important for people to watch if they are computer challenged and need the extra help, but if you want, you can jump to the step-by-step part of the video by fast-forwarding to about 3:25 (depending on your Internet connection speed you may need to wait a few moments before you can do this).

Note: this is the Apple Mac version of this lesson.  If you have a Windows computer you’ll want to watch: How to Undo Computer Mistakes in Microsoft Windows.  If you’re getting this via my podcast, you should get both videos automatically.

In the step-by-step part of the lesson I’ll show you an example of how to undo when writing something, which is probably the best-known way to use this simple but powerful computer skill.  I’ll also show you how to use it when working with files and folders, something which can be a real life saver but which so many people don’t know how to do.

In the over a decade and a half I’ve been helping people with their computers, I’ve noticed a pattern that affects the majority of computer users to one degree or another: being afraid of making computer mistakes holds people back from making progress.

I want to help you become more  confident and skilled with your computer so I recorded this video which gives you some words of encouragement, plus I show you a simple technique you can use in the majority of programs to reverse (or “undo”) mistakes you’ve made.

Now while many people are familiar with the undo function of their computer, many more people are not familiar with it. Those who do know about it often don’t know you can use it in as many ways as you can.

Want to learn the fundamental computer skills that make the rest easy? Take a look at my easy video lesson CDs. I have a simple computer course covering exactly those basic skills that empower you with the confidence you deserve:  Basic Apple Mac Skills

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.

The intro before the step-by-step part of the video is important for people to watch if they are computer challenged and need the extra help, but if you want, you can jump to the step-by-step part of the video by fast-forwarding to about 3:25 (depending on your Internet connection speed you may need to wait a few moments before you can do this).

Note: This is the Windows version of this lesson. There is also an Apple Mac version — if you’re subscribed to my podcast you should get both versions automatically, but if you have a Mac and you’re watching this on my website, you’ll want to click the following link to read: How to Undo Computer Mistakes in Apple Mac OS X

In the over fifteen years I’ve been working as a professional to make computers easy for people, I’ve noticed a lot of things about the people I worked with as well as people I just ran across in my day to day life.  Many many computer users, no matter how bright they are, have a fear of causing problems on their computer by making a mistake.

I think this is understandable, and I try to encourage people to not let fear of making mistakes paralyze you and keep you from moving forward. If you don’t try new things, you never progress.

I recorded this video lesson to help give you some words of encouragement and remind you that you can do it, even if you’ve always felt afraid of moving forward.   I also included steps on how to undo computer mistakes using the “undo” command.

While many people are aware of how this works, many more are not.  And the people who do know about it, don’t always realize you can use it in as many areas as you can, especially missing out on the fact that it can be a real lifesaver when working with files and folders on your computer.

In this easy video lesson I not only explain how to undo in Plain English, but show you two different examples of how you can use it to reverse common types of computer mistakes.  Will it solve every problem magically in every circumstance? Of course not, but it is a powerful but very simple tool you can use to empower yourself with one of the basic skills everyone should know when using their computer.

Want to learn the fundamental computer skills that make the rest easy?

Take a look at my easy video lesson CDs. I have a simple computer course covering exactly those basic skills that empower you with the confidence you deserve: Windows Basics Fundamental Skills

Audio and video lessons also available via computer training podcast.