What Does Download Mean - Computer Terminology Explained

In this article I will answer the questions "what does download mean", "what does install mean" and help you understand some commonly misunderstood computer terminology.

I got an email a couple of days ago in response to my last computer tips newsletter where I talked about the importance of using Firefox instead of Internet Explorer.

A subscriber in Texas named James wrote me the next day and said:

"Dear Mr. Godwin,

I just switched to Firefox, and am having a problem downloading Flash Player. A message tells me I have to close Firefox in order to download it. How can I possibly do that when I'm actually using Firefox as a browser. That's rather like trying to pull myself up by my bootstraps! I'd appreciate any help you can give me. Thanks.

James"

First off James, you made the right decision by switching to Firefox. As I mentioned in my last email, it is a *much* safer option than Internet Explorer, and if you have a Windows computer you're really making a mistake by continuing to use IE (Internet Explorer).

Apple's Mac computers don't have the same security risks, but it also is a good idea for Mac users to avoid IE since it is so out of date that there are not only some security risks in using it, but many websites won't work.

What I think James is running in to is a common misunderstanding of two computer terms -- "downloading" and "installing".

Before I explain the two terms, let me first say that it's not your fault if you misunderstood or confused these terms -- it's very common, and is due to other people misusing the terms around you, as well as because no one has ever explained them in a clear and easy way.

Here's an easy way to understand the two terms "download" and "install".

Downloading is like delivery -- imagine you have ordered something from a catalog, or Amazon.com or someplace. Let's say it's a TV set.

Before you can use the TV set it has to be delivered to you -- shipped to you -- and this is basically what downloading is. A file (like the Mozilla Firefox installer program) has to be sent "down" to your computer (coming from the Internet is down, sending to the Internet is up, so downloading is coming "down" from the Internet from a web page or an email, etc., while uploading is sending it "up" to the Internet to a webpage or via email, etc.)

So if you want to use Firefox, or Flash Player, or other programs, you need to download them and then you need to "install" them.

So downloading is the delivery of the TV, to go back to our analogy, but before you can use the TV you still need to take it out of the box, put it on the stand, plug it in, etc. Set it up for use -- in other words, install it.

So once you've downloaded a program, you then "install" it to get it ready to use.

And here's where I think maybe you're confusing two terms, which is completely OK on your part, but if Adobe (who makes Flash player) is using the term incorrectly on their website, that is not excusable because they should know better. Again, I don't blame you one bit if you've mixed up the terms, it's a very common mistake, but Adobe should know better.

What you need to do is close Firefox once you've downloaded Flash Player, but before you *install* it. This is because Flash Player has to add some information to Firefox, and if Firefox is running, it can't do it. Kind of like how if you're standing on a rug, you can't pick it up to clean it.

Make sense?

So what you need to do James is download Flash Player, then completely close Firefox and *install* Flash Player, by double-clicking the icon of the file you download from Adobe's site, and then it should work.

Hope that helps and makes sense!

Until later, take care and enjoy,

Worth Godwin

P.S. If you have computer questions, feel free to join my free computer tips newsletter, and reply to any of my emails with your question and I'll answer it in a future newsletter email. I also have a monthly live computer Q&A call-in -- I'll be announcing the next one soon in a future email.

P.P.S. As I mentioned in my last email, I'll be recording video lessons for Windows and Mac that show step-by-step how to download and install the new version of Firefox, as well as an overview of using it on this month's Gold Club video lesson CD, and the lessons will also be available on the password-protected Gold Club members-only area of my website.

If you'd like to join in and empower yourself with more knowledge about the computer and how to make it easier, more fun, and more safe & secure, you can take advantage of my free trial membership to the easy computer lessons Gold Club right now and gain instant access to a large library of my video and audio computer lessons by clicking the links.

How Does Wireless Internet Work - A Simple Explanation

In this article I'll help you understand the answer to a computer terminology question I find a lot of people asking: "How does wireless Internet work?".

Before I can answer this question, I have to mention that there are two basic types of wireless Internet: a wireless Internet connection through a device called a router (this type of wireless Internet is called WiFi), and then there is wireless Internet access through the cell phone network.

Wireless routers are very common in homes, offices, and "wireless hotspots" like you find at coffee shops, airports, and elsewhere. These are basically just small electronic "boxes" that hook up to your Internet connection so you can share the connection between several computers, or simply to give you the freedom to place your computer wherever you want, and not just next to the cable or phone outlet.

The cell phone data network (wireless Internet through the cell phone network in other words) of course is very widespread -- pretty much everywhere where you can get a cell signal -- and can be used not only with a cell phone but also with a growing number of computers.

Now if you want to get really technical, these two types of wireless Internet work differently. But in a general sense, if you simplify things and explain them in a basic way that will make sense to the average person, they both work along the same general lines.

So how does wireless Internet work? One way to think of it is by comparing it to a portable phone.

With a portable phone, something most of us have in our home, the phone has two parts: a handset and a cradle.

The cradle gets plugged into the phone line -- the connection to the phone network -- and takes that connection and broadcasts it via radio waves more or less in all directions.

If the handset is within range of the signal, it picks up this signal and relays the telephone connection so you can make or receive a call.

Wireless Internet, whether its via a cell network or a wireless router, works the same basic way: you have a connection to the Internet, which is sent out wirelessly to a receiver of some sort, very much like a portable phone cradle sends out the telephone connection to the handset.

The broadcast can come from a wireless router hooked up to a cable or DSL Internet connection, or the broadcast can be from a cell phone tower hooked into the cell phone network and relaying the Internet connection.

On the other end you have a "handset", which is a receiver in a computer, smart phone, or other device. This could be a WiFi card in a laptop or desktop computer for the one type of wireless Internet, or a receiver in a cell phone or laptop using the cell data network.

So that basically answers the question "how does wireless Internet work".

What is An Operating System or "OS" - A plain English explanation

What is an operating system? In this article I'm going to help you finally make sense of what for most people is one of the most confusing and least understood computer terms around: "operating system", or "OS".

This is actually a pretty easy idea to get when it's explained right.

Now what is an operating system, or OS? First off, it's is a type of software. I explained what software was in my last newsletter article (where I answered the question "what is driver") but here is a recap:

"Software" is all of the parts of the computer that you can't really see or touch. Software would include things like Microsoft Word, your email program, Windows or the Mac OS, plus all of your personal files like letters, photos, music, and more.

One way to think about it is like this: hardware is like your brain, the physical part of your body, while software is like your mind or your thoughts -- the non-physical part of yourself.

Software runs on hardware, just like your thoughts "run on" your brain.

Make sense? So let's get to the OS specifically.

First off, let me give a couple of examples: the two best known operating systems right now are Windows, and Mac OS X (pronounced "Oh Ess Ten" -- as in the Roman numeral ten).

Windows XP and Windows Vista are a couple different versions of the Windows operating system. While Mac OS 10.4 (also called "Tiger") and the newest Mac OS 10.5 (or "Leopard") are two different versions of Mac OS X.

So what *is* an OS?

Think of it this way: when a baby is born, they have the instinct to eat, breathe, and so on, and also the instinct to watch, listen, and absorb what's going on around them.

In time, a young child learns to talk and walk by learning from others, and as they get older, they also learn more fundamental skills like reading and writing, hand-eye coordination, and so on.

So in other words, they go from being able to do not a lot except eat, sleep, and fill diapers, to physical and mental maturity where they have all the general skills they need to learn more specific skills like driving a car, playing a sport like football, writing a paper for school, working a job, etc.

In many ways, when you turn a computer on, it's just like a newborn baby. It has the ability to turn on, and show an image on the screen, but that's about it.

The only other thing it can do is look at the hard drive, and if there is an operating system installed on it, the computer knows to start running the OS.

That process is called "booting", which is what happens between when you turn the computer on, and when you can actually start using it.

And the best way to think about it is that it's just like a child being born and growing up: the operating system contains the "life experiences" and lessons that give a child all the basic skills like walking, talking, reading, writing, and so on, that make everything else possible.

So in a sense, it's like your computer is born and "grows up" in the space of 30 seconds to a minute or so (or longer for some computers) that it takes to "boot" the operating system.

So in other words, the operating system is like those basic skills we all have and learned as children. More specifically, it's the software on the computer that creates the desktop, the icons on it, moves the little mouse pointer around on the screen when you move your mouse around, lets you view files and open, lets you type, and so on.

Without it, you couldn't do anything with the computer but turn it on and see an error message like "non system disk or disk error" on a Windows PC, or a flashing question mark on a Mac.

So even though a lot of people don't really understand what an OS is, or what it does, you couldn't use your computer without it.

Hope that makes sense.

Until next time, enjoy,

Worth Godwin

What is RAM, What is a Hard Drive: A Plain English Explanation

When it comes to a computer, there are so many computer terms like RAM, megahertz, gigabytes, etc. that people can find confusing. Having a better understanding of some of these terms can help you feel more comfortable using your computer, and ultimately get more out of it.

A lot of people I talk to seem to be apologetic about their lack of knowledge. It's too bad people feel that way; they really shouldn't. What I tell them is that while they may not know as much as I do about computers, there's nothing wrong with that, and they probably know a lot of other things I don't know much about.

All you need is someone who takes the time to explain things to you in a way that makes sense.



One term many people confuse is memory or RAM, and hard drive storage space. RAM stands for Random Access Memory (don't worry, you don't need to remember that!).

It is a temporary working space the computer uses to get work done, which gets emptied when the computer is turned off.

Think of it like a work bench or table. You have a project you're working on and you do your project on the bench and when you're done, you clear it off.

The hard drive is the main place your computer uses to store information. It looks like a rectangular metal box which contains a non-removable disk (as opposed to something like a CD Drive where you can take the disk out).

It is the disk inside the drive which stores everything on your computer -- every picture, every music file, every email, and every Word document. Not only that, but Windows or Mac OS X, the operating system (what is an operating system?) that makes the computer run.

To continue our analogy, think of it as a set of shelves where you store the tools or materials for your project -- when you want to work on something you choose the things you need from the shelves, put them on the bench and work on the project.

This is like when you run a program; the computer loads the program from the hard drive into memory (the temporary working space).

So the larger the shelves, the more you can store -- i.e. the more programs you can have installed, the more songs or pictures or videos you can save on your computer.

Most people with a computer made in the last few years have far larger hard drives than they'll ever use. Few people ever fill them up, unless they are keeping a lot of large files such as sound files or pictures, or especially video files.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. If that's true, video is worth at least a million words, and the files can be that much bigger!

If someone tells you you need more memory, or your computer gives you an error message about being low on memory, this usually means you don't have enough RAM. This can slow your computer down drastically.

Think of the bench idea again: if your bench is very small, you can't fit everything you need on it to get your work done, so you're constantly wasting time moving one piece of the project off the bench to make room for the next piece... if you can really work at all.

Both RAM and hard drive space are measured with the same terms: bytes, kilobytes (KB), megabytes (MB), gigabytes (GB), with newer drives even being measured in terabytes (TB). Since both RAM and hard drives are measured in the same way, this may be one reason people confuse the two terms.

You don't need to understand exactly what those terms mean, but understand that each one is basically a thousand times larger than the one before. So a kilobyte is 1,000 times larger than a byte, a megabyte is 1,000 times larger than a kilobyte, a gigabyte is a thousand times later than that, and so on.

The reason you buy a computer one year that has a lot of RAM, and two or three years go by and suddenly someone tells you you don't have enough memory, is because each year the average size of programs, and the amount of memory they need, gets larger.

It's as if the tools you use on your workbench keep growing every year so you eventually have to get a larger bench.

If your computer seems to be running more slowly recently, or you've been having odd errors, it could be that you need to upgrade your memory. This isn't always the source of these problems, but RAM is very inexpensive these days and adding to what your computer has can add life to your Mac or PC.

Hopefully this clears up the meaning of these basic computer terms for you, and made a lot more sense than it used to! To learn more about RAM and memory, read this related article that explains how RAM affects the speed of a computer, and more.

What Is Spyware & Adware and What Is Malware

Has your computer been been running more slowly recently? Has it been crashing? Do you get pop-up ads for no apparent reason?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, you may have fallen victim to malicious types of programs called "malware", a term which includes both adware and spyware.

Adware (advertising software) is a type of program which delivers ads to your computer screen. These adware programs run in the background whenever your computer is on.

This can be annoying because the ads pop up from nowhere, and often contain offensive images, but can also cause conflicts and potentially crash your computer.

There are several ways these programs can get into your system. In some cases you find a shareware program which, for example, delivers up-to-date weather reports to your computer. You download the program and install it, and while it does give you weather reports, it also watches what websites you visit and based on the profile it builds about you delivers targeted ads to your computer screen.

In other cases, the adware program is a completely separate program which is attached to a a program you choose to install. This is almost universally the case with file-trading programs (see my article on file trading risks).

Many adware programs also get installed just by visiting certain websites, as the sites are designed to take advantage of security holes in your web browser, especially those in Internet Explorer.

An even bigger problem is that many of these hidden programs are also spyware — spyware gather information from your computer.

Most commonly they monitor web sites you visit, but some spyware programs are what is known as "keyloggers," which is short for "keystroke loggers." These programs literally record everything you type into your computer, harvesting passwords, credit card numbers, and social security numbers.

This personal information can then be sent off without your knowledge and can be used for identity theft, potentially embarrassing you or even robbing you of thousands of dollars and your good name and credit.

Having spyware on your system is like inviting a stranger into your home and never noticing as he snoops through your drawers, writes down your credit card numbers, and watches your every move.

Most Windows PCs with internet access turn up one or more of these programs lurking unseen. I would personally estimate 80% or more of the Windows machines I look at have adware or spyware installed. According to Symantec, maker of Norton Internet Security, it may be 91% or more. In most cases, the computer users have absolutely no idea their machine is infected.

Fortunately, there are ways to clean up your system if it is infected, and ways to protect yourself from future infections. There are a number of anti-spyware programs out there, but be warned: many of them are scams which actually install more spyware and adware on your system!

Most people find the easiest way to learn how to get more out of their computer and be safe at the same time, is to be shown, step by step, how to do it. Aside from spyware, there are a lot of threats to Windows users that can be very complicated.

But it can be a lot easier than you think with the right help.

My free computer tips email newsletter explains a lot of this in plain English articles, plus when I made my easy computer lesson CDs, I made a big point of including a lot of my quick, easy step by step video lessons on making it easy to protect your computer whether it's a Mac or Windows PC.

Take a look if you feel you need more help.

File Sharing & File Trading - Risks You Should Avoid

Most people who were following the news a few years back have heard of Napster, the music-trading network that was shut down as a result of legal action taken by the recording industry, and which has since been resurrected as a legal music download site.

Not everyone knows that Napster spawned a host of similar programs such as Kazaa, Grokster, and Limewire, and more (many which have come and gone) most of which allow people to trade not just audio files, but virtually any type of file over the internet.

There are now millions of people in the United States alone who are running file trading software on their computers; many do not know the risks involved. These programs usually share virtually every type of file — including everything from compressed .zip or .sit files, to Word and Excel documents, photos and video, and even financial data.

Right now there are thousands if not millions of computers — maybe even yours — sharing personal documents with the world without the owner of the computer realizing it. Maybe because your child or grandchild has installed the software without telling you, or because the software is set up to share the entire hard drive, or both.

This is the electronic equivalent to going to a public place with a box full of personal letters, photos, bank statements, and other private information, dumping it on the ground, and walking away. Except anyone in the world could see your files, not just your neighbors.

Aside from the risk of exposing personal information to strangers, there is also the risk of downloading a virus or a backdoor program which allows people to take control of your computer remotely, and the problem of adware and spyware.

Adware and spyware are malicious programs which come with virtually every file trading program. They slow your computer down while spying on you and filling your computer screen with popup ads for everything from refinancing your home, to Viagara, to pornography, problems I cover in more detail in other articles.

It's also important to realize that most file trading, especially if it involves downloading music, movies, or computer programs, is illegal. To be more specific, file trading or file sharing is not illegal in of itself, but the things that are being shared are being shared illegally because it breaks copyright laws.

I'm not making a judgment of whether this is right or wrong -- that's none of my business -- but if you or someone you know is doing this, the recording industry is still suing people like crazy for illegally downloading music and other copyrighted material.

There are legal alternatives to file trading programs such as Apple's iTunes Music Store (Mac and Windows compatible). It does cost money to buy music online, but it is often cheaper than buying CDs at a store, and a lot cheaper than being sued for thousands, or having someone steal your identity by downloading financial documents off your computer.

Just something to think about.�

What is Shareware & Freeware - Understanding Different Types of Software

There is a huge variety of software available to run on personal computers, from business applications, to games, to screensavers.

Most people are aware of commercial software — software you buy in a box at a store — but many internet users have also heard of shareware and freeware programs.

Freeware, as the name implies, is software you can use for free. It can usually be copied to anyone as long as it’s not changed.

More common is shareware: software that you can also copy freely, but which comes with a trial period after which you are supposed to either pay for it or stop using it.

Some shareware programs will allow only limited features during the trial period to give you a taste of what you can get for the full price, others give you all features but you must wait through a time-delayed message asking you to register. Many of the full-featured shareware programs stop working if you keep trying to use them afer the trial period.

Commercial software tends to be written by a group of professionals with a lot of testing done before release to ensure quality and compatibility. Shareware and freeware, on the other hand, often tends to be written by one or two people in their spare time to make some extra money, to practice their software writing skills, or even as a way to show their skills off to get a job.

Because of these factors, there is a large difference in quality from one program to another, which sometimes means they can cause problems on your system if your download and install them, especially screensavers and programs that are always running in the background.

Downloading, as you may know, is the process of copying a file from a different computer to yours over a network.

It is always important to scan any software you download for viruses — some copies of legitimate programs can be infected by viruses, and creators of viruses sometimes disguise their malicious programs as useful ones.

You also should scan programs to make sure they aren't adware or spyware. If you're not aware of adware and spyware programs, they are malicious programs which can cause problems as serious as viruses and worms. I suggest you read my article on adware and spyware which is elsewhere on this site.

There are, however, some very high quality programs available for download. These include, among many many others, WinZip, Stuffit Expander, GraphicConverter, Apple's iTunes (which runs on both Macs and PCs) and Ad-Aware (a spyware & adware removal tool).

If you're looking for software to download, you can find different programs, rated by other computer users on Shareware.com and Versiontracker.com, and other sites. �

For help on downloading and installing programs, plus tips on avoiding installing risky software, take a look at my basic computer lesson CDs for Windows and Mac.

What is Spam & What Does Spam Stand For - Tips to Avoid Email Spam

I find a lot of people asking me questions like "What is spam?" "What does spam stand for?" In this article, I'm going to explain the term spam where it comes from (what it stands for) and give you a few tips to avoid email spam.

Do you hate spam? I’m not talking about the food, but the seemingly endless stream of annoying commercial emails that flood most people’s inboxes. The content of the messages range from mortgage rates to enlarging various body parts, to pornography, and their numbers grow every day — up to 500 percent in the eighteen months prior to March, 2003. As of April, 2004, over eighty percent of all email was spam. Since then, it's risen as high as 95%!

Spam is named after a classic skit from Monty Python's Flying Circus, which took place in a diner where everything on the menu had spam in it. During the whole skit, a chorus of vikings keeps chanting a song about spam, drowning out conversations.

Yes, it's a little random (that's Monty Python for you) but it's very funny. Years later, the skit reminded someone of how email in your inbox can get lost in all of the junk mail (the conversation gets drowned out by "Spam! Spam! Spam!"), so they started calling junk email "spam" and the name stuck.

It can be hard to avoid getting your email address on somebody’s list. It’s not uncommon for many people to receive 50 to 100 pieces of spam in a single day -- some people get hundreds a day! -- and the problem is growing worse.

Fortunately there are ways for individuals to reduce the amount of spam they get. Here are a few good tips:

• Never try to unsubscribe or ask to be removed. Those emails may include a link or a reply address to unsubscribe, but 95% either simply don’t work, or you confirm to the spammers that they have a live one.
  
  
• Never order anything advertised in spam, visit the website, or in any way respond to the ad. Every order or inquiry encourages the spammers to send thousands of more ads.
  
  
• Try to avoid entering your email address on dubious websites as much as possible, and if you do, consider getting a second email account with Yahoo mail or a similar service and enter that address instead of your main email. Most websites offering contests, joke lists, free greeting cards, etc. harvest and sell your email address.
  
  
• Never sign an online guestbook. As an experiment a while back, I created a new email address and entered it on about five guestbooks. Within 24 hours I was getting spam, and it grew to dozens a day within a week.
  
  
• Try to avoid opening an unsolicited ad while connected to the internet -- this can alert spammers that they have a live address, so if your email application has a “work offline” option, often found in the file menu, select it before opening suspect emails, or disconnect from the internet entirely.
  If you use a web-based email service like Yahoo Mail, check your mail options for a setting to turn off graphics in emails, or to display mail in plain text only. This keeps the spammers from knowing you've opened the message.
  
  
• Avoid forwarding emails to large numbers of people: Not everyone realizes that when you forward a message, the email addresses of everyone who receives the message is visible to every person who reads it.
  
  If any of the recipients is a spammer, or if one of a friend's computer is infected by certain viruses, they can harvest all of those addresses, including yours.
  
  If you do send an email to multiple recipients you can avoid revealing email addresses by entering addresses in the BCC (Blind Carbon Copy) area instead of To or CC — this will hide the list of addresses from everyone else.
  
  You should also copy and paste just the message into a new message window rather than hitting the forward button — this trims the message down and protects the privacy of others.

As for dealing with the spam you already receive, most email programs allow you to create “filters” or “rules” that move incoming email into a specified folder or even right into the trash.

Setting filters up can be complicated, but the newer versions of many email programs, including Mozilla Thunderbird and Mac OS X Mail make it much easier. The programs have a free spam blocker built right in, and recognize patterns in spam, and use your address book as a white list of legit senders.

Any spam that shows up in your inbox can be marked (and automatically deleted) with a click, and the more spam you mark, the better the program gets at automatically taking care of them so you end up seeing a lot less junk than you used to.

Many internet providers also provide a free spam blocker which filters email before it gets to your computer. The problem with this is that they often block legitimate mail and you may never know about it. Because of this, I recommend using filtering software on your own computer, such as the above mentioned programs.

Ultimately, spam is a fact of modern life, and isn't entirely avoidable. If your current email address is about to collapse from the amount of spam you get, you might be forced to get a new one. After that, if you follow the tips above, you'll have a good chance of keeping it under control.

What is a definition of the World Wide Web & who started the phrase World Wide Web

What is a definition of the World Wide Web & who started the phrase World Wide Web

In this article I'm going to address two related questions I've gotten: "what is a definition of the world wide web" and "who started the phrase world wide web".

First off, let me give you a definition of the World Wide Web -- which these days is usually just called The Web.

The Web is made up of millions and millions of pages of information that are linked together across the globe.

When you look at a web page, which you're probably doing right now (unless you're reading this in my free computer email newsletter and not on my archive of my computer articles or on one of the free article sites I've submitted the article to) you'll find that the page has "links" that you click on to take you to different pages.

If you could see a picture of all of the web pages on the Internet, you could imagine that it might look like a spider web, with many strands connecting one point to another.

This is just how a guy named Tim Berners-Lee imagined it when he came up with the phrase World Wide Web. The links are the strands, and the web pages are the points where the strands come together.

Tim Berners-Lee, with help from a man named Robert Cailliau, created the Web based on something called "hypertext".

Hypertext was an idea where you could have "hyperlinks" (which we now just call "links") that would allow you to read information and easily move between related topics.

So if you were reading about, for example, the first printing press, the Gutenberg Bible would probably be mentioned because it's one of the best-known books to be printed on the first printing presses.

With hypertext, when you saw the words Gutenberg Bible, they would be a link to an article that would go into more detail about that book.

Berners-Lee wanted to bring this idea to the Internet, allowing people to "browse" around, using these links to move from one place to another.

Before this, you had to go to a specific address, then go to another specific address, and not browse the way we are used to today.

And as you've probably guessed by now, Berners-Lee was the person who started the phrase World Wide Web in the first place.

So another way to explain what is a definition of the World Wide Web is a way of looking at the Internet as a series of "pages" of information -- words, pictures, sounds, or video -- that link from one to another to another, forming a giant "web" of information that covers and connects the world.

One more point, to clarify a common misunderstanding. The Web is *part* of the Internet, just like email is *part* of the Internet -- a lot of people think the Internet is exactly the same thing as the Web, and that email is somehow completely separate from the Internet. This is not the case.

I have another article, available by clicking the following link which explains the computer terms Internet and email, if you need more help with those computer terms.

Computer terms explained: Understanding what a "OS" or "Operating System" is

OK, in this article I'm going to help you finally make sense of what for most people is one of the most confusing and least understood computer terms around: "operating system", or "OS".

This is actually a pretty easy idea to get when it's explained right.

Now an operating system, or OS, is a type of software.

To recap my explanation from my last newsletter article:

"Software" is all of the parts of the computer that you can't really see or touch. Software would include things like Microsoft Word, your email program, Windows or the Mac OS, plus all of your personal files like letters, photos, music, and more.

One way to think about it is like this: hardware is like your brain, the physical part of your body, while software is like your mind or your thoughts -- the non-physical part of yourself.

Software runs on hardware, just like your thoughts "run on" your brain.

Make sense? So let's get to the OS specifically.

First off, let me give a couple of examples: the two best known operating systems right now are Windows, and Mac OS X (pronounced "Oh Ess Ten" -- as in the Roman numeral ten).

Windows XP and Windows Vista are a couple different versions of the Windows operating system. While Mac OS 10.4 (also called "Tiger") and the brand new Mac OS 10.5 (or "Leopard") are two different versions of Mac OS X.

So what *is* an OS?

Think of it this way: when a baby is born, they have the instinct to eat, breathe, and so on, and also the instinct to watch, listen, and absorb what's going on around them.

In time, a young child learns to talk and walk by learning from others, and as they get older, they also learn more fundamental skills like reading and writing, hand-eye coordination, and so on.

So in other words, they go from being able to do not a lot except eat, sleep, and fill diapers, to physical and mental maturity where they have all the general skills they need to learn more specific skills like driving a car, playing a sport like football, writing a paper for school, working a job, etc.

In many ways, when you turn a computer on, it's just like a newborn baby. It has the ability to turn on, and show an image on the screen, but that's about it.

The only other thing it can do is look at the hard drive, and if there is an operating system installed on it, the computer knows to start running the OS.

That process is called "booting", which is what happens between when you turn the computer on, and when you can actually start using it.

And the best way to think about it is that it's just like a child being born and growing up: the operating system contains the "life experiences" and lessons that give a child all the basic skills like walking, talking, reading, writing, and so on, that make everything else possible.

So in a sense, it's like your computer is born and "grows up" in the space of 30 seconds to a minute or so (or longer for some computers) that it takes to "boot" the operating system.

So in other words, the operating system is like those basic skills we all have and learned as children. More specifically, it's the software on the computer that creates the desktop, the icons on it, moves the little mouse pointer around on the screen when you move your mouse around, lets you view files and open, lets you type, and so on.

Without it, you couldn't do anything with the computer but turn it on and see an error message like "non system disk or disk error" on a Windows PC, or a flashing question mark on a Mac.

So even though a lot of people don't really understand what an OS is, or what it does, you couldn't use your computer without it.

Hope that makes sense.

Until next time, enjoy,

Worth Godwin

Choosing the right kind of Internet service provider (ISP)

In this article I'm going to explain some of the differences between different options for ways to connect to the Internet.

First off, let me explain the two *general* types of Internet connection before getting more specific about some of the more specific types within these two general categories.

When looked at as simply as possible (or as "big chunk" as possible, to use a term I explain on my special report "Secrets Of Skyrocketing Your Computer Skills" that's available on CD from my website) there are two common types of Internet connection: dialup and "broadband".

Dialup is, of course, the old fashioned way to connect to the Internet, using a dialup modem. Dialup modems have been around far longer than most people realize: I bought my first one around 1986.

It was a "1200 bps" (bps is a measurement of speed) modem that I paid about $200 for back in the day. Dialup modems capped out at 56K bps a good ten years or more ago, and now sell for under $10 if you know where to look.

So that's about 46 times faster, and 20 times cheaper.

Now you might be thinking "I think I read somewhere that my computer has a 56K modem in it. That must be pretty fast then!"

If you're thinking that, you're wrong.

Dialup is old technology, and hasn't really improved in about ten years, which if you remember my article from a couple of weeks ago where I mentioned Moore's Law, means it's about 150 years out of date in relative terms!

So the simple way to think of it is, dialup = slow.

Many people are using dialup still, either because they don't see any reason not to, or they have no choice where they live.

But what I want to tell you is that even if you are currently using dialup and think "it's good enough, so why bother upgrading?" -- you're making a mistake.

I'll tell you why in a minute.

First, let me explain the general alternative to dialup. It's called "broadband", which basically just means "fast ".

Broadband comes in a number of varieties, with a range of speeds, all of them a lot faster than dialup.

Aside from being much faster, broadband generally doesn't tie up your phone line, so people don't get busy signals if they try calling you, and you can make phone calls while you're online.

The two most common types of broadband are cable and DSL. Cable internet comes over the same cable as cable TV, and is offered by a variety of companies with different brand names -- Roadrunner is one example of cable internet.

DSL actually comes over your phone lines like dialup, but is much faster and, like cable Internet, you can make phone calls while you're connected.

You also have less-used options like satellite, which gives you fairly fast connections to the Internet over a satellite dish like satellite TV. It is pretty slow for broadband, but a lot faster than dialup. It's mostly used by people out in the boonies who don't have any better option.

What I suggest to most people is to get DSL, if they can get it where they live. In most cases it's only slightly more expensive than dialup is, and in some cases it's the same price or even cheaper!

It's not usually as fast as cable Internet, but it is plenty fast for most people, and lets you do a lot of things that just aren't possible (or are very very annoyingly slow) on dialup, such as watching videos on YouTube or other sites, or downloading large files.

Which brings me to one of the biggest reasons I think people should stop using dialup and switch to some kind of broadband -- downloading large files.

You might think that you never do that, but not so fast... Maybe you do (or should be) and don't realize it.

First off, people are sending around large pictures (or several smaller pictures) via , and even videos via email all the time now. If you're on dialup and you tried checking your email one day and it never seemed to be able to get the new messages, or it took forever to do it, you may have become a victim of this.

So there's that reason.

But there's an even more important one: computers have things called "security updates" or "patches" which are critically important to download. It's important for both Windows or Macs.

Without these patches, your computer can be vulnerable to attacks by viruses, worms, and more.

But these security updates (think Windows Update, or Macs' Software Update) sometimes can be very large files.

So large that it can take hours and hours, or even DAYS to download. And if you don't download them, your computer is vulnerable.

Which leaves you between a rock and a hard place if you're still using dialup.

So think about switching if you haven't already, and forward this to your friends who haven't.

In my next article, I'll talk a little about switching ISPs (Internet Service Providers) and how to do it without losing all of your bookmarks, email addresses, etc.

until then,

Worth Godwin

Understanding the Computer Terms Web, Internet & Email

In this article I want to help you understand the computer terms Web, Internet, and Email.

Now you may think you know what these computer terms mean, but I've found that in fact, most people misuse and misunderstand 2 or 3 of those words every day!

Now please understand me -- it's not your fault if you sometimes get computer terminology wrong. It's just never been explained to you the right way for you to really get it, and chances are, you've been hearing other people misuse the terms too, since it's pretty common to mix them up.

Let me see if I can make it easier for you.

Let's start with email -- this is the one that most people get basically right, although they still misunderstand one important thing about it (more on that in a minute).

Email is, of course, "electronic mail" -- a pretty simple concept to get. Its the computer equivalent of a traditional letter. Traditional mail through the post office is often called "snail mail" these days because it takes days to get to the person you're sending it to, unlike email which can take seconds (although sometimes can take hours).

Even snail mail is pretty amazingly fast compared to how it used to be back in the day, when it could take weeks or months to get to someone.

Just like regular mail, email has a sort of post office that it goes through - something called a "mail server".

There are two types of mail server - POP and SMTP. But I prefer to use the terms incoming and outgoing because it makes more sense than the technical terms.

Don't worry about what the letters POP and SMTP stand for. Just remember:

POP = incoming, for mail that's coming in to you

and

SMTP = outgoing, for the email you're sending out.

Let's talk about the word "Web" now.

The Web is what most people think of as "the Internet" -- it's the web pages, or pages of words, pictures, and sometimes sounds and videos even, which you go and visit using your "web browser".

A web browser is just a program that lets you look at web pages -- most Windows people click on the blue E, which is Internet Explorer (made by Microsoft and given away with every copy of Windows, which is why most people use it. NOT because it's the best option).

Most Mac people with fairly new Macs use Apple's web browser Safari, which looks like a little compass.

Other people, both Mac users and Windows users, use a different program called Mozilla Firefox.

For a lot of good reasons, I strongly strongly recommend that Windows users do NOT use "the blue E" -- Internet Explorer -- the main reason is because it is very unsafe and is almost a guarantee that your PC will get infected with something nasty.

Mac users should not use "the blue E" (Internet Explorer) either, but more because it's very out of date and just doesn't work with many modern websites anymore.

One way to think of a web browser is like a car that lets you drive around on the "information super-highway" as they used to call the Web back in the 90s.

Some brands of cars are safer than others -- you could almost think of Internet Explorer as one of those old Poison Pintos, and Mozilla Firefox as a Volvo -- not a guarantee to save you from harm, but a lot safer than a Pinto!

One point of confusion some people have is that sometimes you can use web browsers to read your email. Like if you use Yahoo mail or Hotmail.

In that case, you are looking at your email through what's called "webmail" because you are using Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, or Apple's Safari to view your mail.

It's kind of like going to the post office and reading your mail there. Throwing some of it away, and then putting the stuff you want to keep back in the post office box for storage.

Using an email program like Outlook, Mozilla Thunderbird, Eudora, or Apple's OS X Mail, is more like reading your mail at home, and storing the stuff you want to keep at home instead of at the post office.

Now let's talk about the last term: the Internet.

This may be, out of the three terms I've been talking about, the one that is most mis-used.

Here's the thing: the Internet contains BOTH the Web AND email.

But many many people, probably most people in fact, talk as if the Internet was a separate thing from email or the web, when in fact the web and email are both just *parts* of the Internet.

Or another way to put it is that the web and email are just certain ways of looking at all of the information that's available on the Internet as a whole.

The Internet is really just a big "network" of interconnected computers that talk to each other and share information. Some of it is presented as web pages, some of it as email, and so on.

Hope that all makes sense.

Thanks for reading,

Worth Godwin