Thursday, January 23, 2020

Computer Club Class Notes 1-21-2020

Edge Chromium Browser Launches
Microsoft is officially launching its new Edge Chromium browser today across both Windows and macOS. A stable version of the browser is now available for everyone to download, just over a year after the software maker revealed its plans to switch to Chromium. Microsoft is initially targeting Edge at enterprise users of Windows and macOS, but consumers will be able to manually download and install it, too.

We downloaded and installed it during class and it worked well; a lot like Chrome and Brave.
https://tinyurl.com/wlldfcs

Google Chrome will support Windows 7 until at least July 2021
Microsoft will end support for its Windows 7 operating system next week on January 14, 2020. The last Patch Day for Windows 7 will provide users with a last round of security updates before support ends.
https://tinyurl.com/vmuofz2

Windows 7 Upgrade
Here is an article I wrote on moving from 7 to 10
https://davescomputertips.com/windows-7-death-knell-thoughts/

Is CCleaner Safe?
Some Windows software has become so ingrained into PC users’ minds that we don’t think twice to recommend them. Unfortunately, this leads to major issues when a popular tool goes rogue. That’s exactly what’s happened with CCleaner. Once everyone’s favorite Windows maintenance utility, its increasingly shady behavior means that you should now leave it in the dust.
https://tinyurl.com/yc2j7b6z

Some Windows software has become so ingrained into PC users’ minds that we don’t think twice to recommend them. Unfortunately, this leads to major issues when a popular tool goes rogue. That’s exactly what’s happened with CCleaner. Once everyone’s favorite Windows maintenance utility, its increasingly shady behavior means that you should now leave it in the dust.



We are testing out Wise Disk Cleaner. It look like a good alternative to CCleaner. I think Glary is also a good alternative and is part of Ninite.
https://tinyurl.com/yc2j7b6z

9 Best Free Microsoft Office Alternatives
Here are several free Microsoft Office alternatives that contain similar versions of Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Access. Many of the Microsoft Office free alternatives listed below open, edit, and create Office documents. Although they don't have all the cool Office features, many get close.
https://tinyurl.com/rf5yrx3 

I use Google Docs for most of my word processing. I do use MS Word since I own a copy and I can access Word on my Microsoft account on the web using my OneDrive. There are mini-versions of all the Office applications available there for free.

What about WordPad? It is free as it comes with Windows. It is useful for most of what iI use Word for and is very quick to open. The only downside is that it does not include a spell checker. Enter tinySpell. This is a very small spell checker that adds the capability to WordPad among other applications.

LibreOffice vs OpenOffice
In a battle between OpenOffice versus LibreOffice, which office software suite would win? They're both 100% free and are great alternatives to MS Office, but which one will bring home the productivity title for you or your organization?
https://tinyurl.com/vmju8q6

Notes is a simple and free note-taking application for Windows
Sometimes, we may need a quick way to write down something. Notes is a simple and free note-taking application for Windows that can be used for that.

This was an interesting article but we downloaded and installed it during class. It seemed very difficult to use.
https://tinyurl.com/r5bhwms


Simple Sticky Notes
We reminisced about the sticky notes that came with Vista. So we did a Google search and found one. It was easy to install and works just like the one we remembered. It adds yellow (or whatever color you choose) notes to the desktop. You can resize them and type whatever you need right on them!
https://www.simplestickynotes.com/download/

Sticky Notes

Then I found that a similar application is built into Windows! To find the application in Windows 10, click on your start button and type in sticky notes. If you do not have a place to type then Win+Q will show the place to type. Select the Sticky Notes option. Right-click the entry in your start menu and select Pin to taskbar so you can open the program directly from your desktop.

Informed Delivery
I demonstrated how I receive an email from the USPS each morning showing me what mail to expect that day. Here is the site to access to set that up for you.
https://tinyurl.com/seh3vpo

Backup Review
I have written an article on backing up using EaseUS. You can download the application from the club site at www.cccgc.info and read the article at:
https://davescomputertips.com/how-to-lets-talk-backups/





Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Computer Club Notes 1-14-2020

What version of Windows 10 do I have?



Win+R and type WINVER and press Enter

If you have Windows 7 or 8 or 8.1, you can still upgrade to Windows 10 for free. Head over to the Download Windows 10 page and attempt the upgrade.


Click Download tool now

Install and run the Media Creation Tool


Open the tool and select Upgrade this PC now
Follow the steps



Ninite

Ninite is the safest site to install programs from. When you open ninite.com you are presented with a list of programs to select from. You check the ones you want and then click the Get Installer button. That does not download any of the programs you have checked, it downloads a tiny program to your computer with a list of the programs you checked.



When you run that installer program it looks over each program selected to see if you have it already installed on your computer. If not, it downloads and installs it. If you already have the program it compares the version on your computer to the available one. If the one you have is already the latest, it does nothing with that program. If the one you have is older, the latest is downloaded and installed for you.

The next time you want to check to see if you have the latest updates you do not have to go to ninite and start over. If you still have the installer program on your computer, just double-click it.

Mouse Adjustments


Win+I > Devices



Mouse > Adjust mouse & cursor size



Drag to change the size



Click Additional mouse options



Mouse locator
Ever have trouble locating the mouse? It is there somewhere but you can’t see it. One simple switch and hitting the ctrl key will display flashing circles around the pointer.

Uninstalling a Program
We got into this because I was talking about not having antivirus programs on your Windows 10 PC. Windows comes with Windows Security which includes a great antivirus called Defender. To remove the antivirus that came with your PC:

Win+I > Apps and give it time to display all the apps on your PC. Scroll down and locate the one to uninstall.



Click on it and then choose Uninstall

Office Alternatives

Microsoft includes a free trial to Office 365 with every Windows 10 install. There are many other “office” programs to use instead and at no charge.

At live.com you can use an online version of Microsoft Office at no charge. It saves the files in OneDrive, the Microsoft Cloud.

Google Docs saves its files in the Google Cloud and it is free at docs.google.com

OpenOffice and LibreOffice and WPS are all office suites that are free and can be installed on your computer. They do not use the cloud.

Flash in Edge
Edge has a Flash component built-in. Turn it off to deactivate it.



Click Settings.

Click View advanced settings. It is on the left

Click the switch beneath Use Adobe Flash Player so that it turns Off.

Google Keep
Google Keep is what I use to keep our shopping list. We each can make entries on our cell phone and use it at the market to get all we want instead of getting there and trying to remember what we need.

Shift+Ctrl+B
Turns on and off the bookmark bar on the browser

Shift+Win+S
Lets you draw a box around an item on the screen and save it to the clipboard

Win+V
Displays the contents of the clipboard