The Computer Tutor

Last Monday I posted about how to handle a couple of specific computer emergencies (a spilled drink on your laptop, and a failing hard drive).  This week in Part 2, we’ll cover two more emergency situations that require to you take action right away.

No need for panic if you plan ahead

Computer emergency #3: Thunderstorm

How to react:  If you hear thunder, or see lightning, unplug your computer(s) from the wall.  That’s the policy in our house – whenever there is a sign of a thunderstorm, we unplug all of the computers and the large screen TV.  In other words, the expensive things.

Be aware – just turning it off does not protect it.  You have to disconnect the power cord from the outlet.

“It’s okay, I have a surge protector!”  Sorry, that doesn’t matter.  Don’t get me wrong; a surge protector is a good thing to have.  The voltage coming out of your wall outlet can go up and down, and a surge protector keeps that fluctuation from damaging your computer.  But it’s no match to defend against a nearby lightning strike.  I’ve seen many computers that have been fried, even behind a surge protector.  It’s like saying, “I drive 160 mph on my motorcycle, but I’m safe because I always wear my helmet!”.  Helmets are good, but if you hit a tree at that speed your story will not have a happy ending.

There’s one thing that I don’t bother unplugging: my router/modem.  Our internet is Verizon FIOS, so the modem and router are one unit, and Verizon owns it.  I leave that plugged in and turned on, which means I can still go online with my laptop (battery power of course) and I can still connect my phone to wifi.  Worse case scenario is that the Verizon modem gets zapped, and I’m willing to risk that since Verizon will just replace it with a new one.

How to prevent this:  If you have a way of preventing inclement weather, I’d like to talk to you.

Computer emergency #4: Your laptop is stolen

How to react:  There are a few things you’ll need to do right away, and they won’t necessarily be in this order:

Encrypting the drive with a good password keeps everything safe from anyone trying to get in (note that I am not talking about just a Windows password here).  But not everyone needs that level of security.  If this is a concern, get in touch with me and I can help you with this.

How to prevent this:  Preventing a laptop from getting stolen is mostly common sense.  Keep an eye on it, don’t leave it unattended, that kind of thing.  If you leave it in your car, cover it up with something and always lock the doors.  But these things are not a guarantee.  You have to be prepared for this to happen.  If you don’t think about this and plan for it ahead of time, it will be much harder to deal with.

I’ve written about the Prey Project in the past.  It’s free.  Set up a free account and get their little background program running on your computer.  When the thief goes online with your laptop, the software sends a signal out, telling its location with pretty good accuracy based on the wifi connection.  And even better – it will use the webcam to take a picture of the person using it.  You might even know the person, which means you can tell the police exactly where to go and recover your laptop.  There are lots of stories about that happening, which you can read on the Prey Project website.

To keep the thief out of your websites and any account that requires a password, you can simply use your free LastPass account.  That way, the software remembers all of your passwords for you, but the bad guy can’t log in to any of your accounts because he doesn’t know your LastPass password (so make that a good one).  I can help you set that up too.

And, you have to be prepared for possibly never getting your laptop back.  Which means if you have no backup, you lose all your documents, pictures, music, etc.  That is 100% preventable with an automated backup.

Do you know how you react when suddenly you find yourself in an emergency situation?  Some people can think calmly and do what needs to be done in spite of the chaos that may be all around them.  Other people freeze up or panic and don’t really know what they should be doing – and by the time they figure it out, it could be too late for them to do anything.

When I was a kid, this was my Saturday night

What I’m talking about today is not a car accident or some other life-threatening situation – in those cases your only option might be to call 911 (or whatever the emergency number is in your country) and wait for the professionals to arrive.

What we’re covering today are computer emergencies.  In fact, I will be talking about four specific situations that happen on a regular basis – two today, and two this coming Monday.  Perhaps you have been involved in one or more of these already.  If not, pay close attention – your turn might be coming up!

Computer emergency #1: Spilled drink

How to react:  First thing you should do is unplug the power cord (if it’s plugged in).  Then, remove the battery.  You need to stop the flow of electrical current as quickly as you can.  Then, use a dry hand towel to soak up as much of the liquid as you can see.

Avoid the temptation to wait a few minutes and see if it will power up again.  That could do more damage, since there is still liquid inside – probably pooling up on the motherboard.  Liquids, especially water, conduct electricity.  So trying to turn it back on before it’s completely dry is likely to just do further damage.  Take it to a computer professional to get it back in order.

(If you are using your desktop computer, and the only thing that got wet was the keyboard, then it’s no big deal – just go buy a new keyboard and be more careful next time.)

How to prevent this:  Easiest way to prevent this from happening is to follow a strict rule – no drinks near computers.  Or, if you must have your water nearby, make it a bottled water and keep the lid on except for when you’re drinking.  Very few people follow this rule, which is why most are surprised when their computer takes a bath.

Computer emergency #2: Hard drive failing

How to react: If there is anything on this computer that is important, that’s not backed up (such as Documents, Pictures, Music, emails, etc.), turn the computer off immediately and don’t turn it back on.  The more you use this computer, the more chance you will destroy the data that you need to save.  Bring the computer to your local computer pro so that he can get the data off the drive before it actually does crash.  Then, in most cases, you can put in a new hard drive and reinstall Windows, then restore your files back from this emergency backup that was just done.

How to prevent this: Frankly, there’s not a whole lot you can do.  Hard drives crash, and it’s happening more frequently now than it used to.  The latest stats I’ve heard is that 80% of new hard drives will fail within the first 3 years of use.  You could run a hard drive repair program on your drive as part of an ongoing maintenance program.  That’s something that I do on my own computer, but I’m a tech.  The average computer user isn’t going to do that.

While you might not be able to prevent the drive from crashing, you can prevent that situation from becoming a disaster.  Just set up an automated backup process.  I’ll set this up for you and I don’t even charge for my time to do it.  I can set it up remotely in about 10 minutes.  Contact me for details.

Next week: Two other types of computer emergencies that you should be ready to handle (click to read).

Sometimes things happen during the routine course of the week, and suddenly I realize – that’s a good topic for a blog post.  That’s what happened this past week.

If you’re on Facebook, you know there is a high volume of pure garbage that gets “Liked” and shared.  I’m not necessarily talking about content that is inappropriate (although there is a lot of that too).  What I’m referring to are all the “news” stories that are just plain fake.  And especially the photos.

And the sad thing is, people post this crap because they actually believe it’s genuine and true.  They see it posted by one of their friends, and the story generates some kind of emotion (sadness, anger, fear, whatever – it doesn’t really matter).  So they must immediately share it with all of their friends as well.  And of course there is no research done to check and see if what they are spreading around has any truth to it.

Here is what I saw this past week.  Someone I am friends with on Facebook posted a link to a news article.  The article was titled “Muslims crucify two teen boys for being Christians” and had a graphic image of a young man who was supposedly one of the guys talked about in the article.  It’s not an “extremely” graphic image (you can see the image here and the article that used it is here).

The important thing, however, is that the image is not even a genuine part of the article.  The article writer (I won’t call him a “journalist”) just grabbed an image from a different news story and used it in his own article.  The image was actually originally published a few weeks prior to when this article used it.

So that brings up the question – how do you know when a website article or blog post is using an image that genuinely goes with the story?  After all, if they’re faking the picture, it really casts doubt on everything else in the story too.

There is probably more than one way to check on this.  But the easiest way is to use Google Chrome (that’s Google’s web browser – just another program to view websites, like Firefox and Internet Explorer).  Chrome is a free download, and it’s the browser I use most of the time now.  (Firefox is a close second, and Internet Explorer is a distant third.)

Here’s how to use Chrome to authenticate a picture:

Do a right-click on the image, and in the menu that appears, choose “Search Google for this image”.

At that point, Google will check and see where else this image has appeared recently.   You might be surprised at the results!

In the example I mentioned above, the story about the 2 young men who had supposedly been crucified for not renouncing their Christianity, the picture that was used had actually come from a different earlier news story that had nothing to do with the one that was posted on Facebook.  I figured this out in the 5 seconds it takes to do this simple process in Chrome.

In addition to verifying the truth of a news article, there are other uses for this little trick:

Craigslist shopping – Maybe you’re shopping for a car on Craigslist, and you come across what seems like an incredible deal.  Low mileage, good condition, fairly new, and priced WAY too low.  Is it real or is it a scam post?  Most scammers on Craigslist don’t just pick one location to post their fake ads.  They post in a lot of different locations.  So you can search Google for the pictures in the ad.  If you see those same pictures in ads in your city as well as other places throughout the US, it’s a scam.

Your website – If you have a website and you publish original content, including images, there’s a chance that someone might come across your site and take one of  your images to use on their site.  Or they might take several.  How would you know, unless you checked on it?  In the past, I have found people taking my content and reposting it, word for word, as their own.   A quick Google search on some of your own original images can help you find out if this is happening, so you can take action to stop it.

And now, just for your entertainment, some pictures that were once widely believed to be genuine, and later turned out to be fakes:

This picture was supposedly found in a camera that was in the rubble of the World Trade Center after the attack on September 11, 2001.  It’s fake.

After Hurricane Irene, this picture emerged and went viral, showing a shark swimming in the flooded streets of Puerto Rico.  It’s fake.

And finally – check out this tennis court.  The interesting part about this photo is that it is actually real.  The big circle is actually a helicopter landing area in Dubai.  They set it up as a tennis court for a match between Andre Agassi and Roger Federer in 2005 (story here).

Have you ever gotten a PDF file by email, and you had to sign it and send it back by email?  For most people, that process is a real hassle.  You have to print the PDF file, then you sign the printed copy, then you have to scan that paper back into a new PDF file and save it to your computer, then email it back to whoever sent it to you.  It’s a lot of steps for what should be a pretty simple process.

Good news… there is a much easier way!  And it does not require any printing or scanning.

This is one of the advantages of having Adobe Reader as your default PDF program.  I know there are others that are “lighter” and don’t have updates as often, but Adobe Reader has some excellent features (like the one I’m about to show you) that most of the others don’t have.

The most recent time this came up with me was when I purchased a new car.  My insurance agent emailed me a PDF file, which I needed to sign and return to him in order to confirm the changes to our car insurance policy.  The document was very straightforward, and at the end there was a place for my signature.  It looked like this:

As you can see, there’s a line that needs my signature.  But it’s only on my computer screen!  What to do?

There are actually a few ways to accomplish this.  But they all start with this first step:  Click on the “Sign” link in the top right area:

Then, in the “I Need to Sign” section, click on “Place Signature” –

This will bring up a new window, and that’s where you will find a few options about how to place your signature where the form requires it to show up:

I’ll cover each of these options individually:

Type my signature – This is probably the easiest and fastest option.  The downside is that most people that look at it will be able to tell that it’s just a computer-generated signature, not one that you wrote by hand.  You just type your name in the box, and the computer displays your name in 4 different fonts so you can choose which one to use.  I think the 4th one is the one that would most resemble an actual signature:

Draw my signature – This is where you would actually use your mouse to drag the virtual “pen” on the screen and sign your name.  The disadvantage to this one is that it will look like it was written by a monkey with a broken hand.  You just can’t control the mouse the way you would control an actual pen in your hand.  Here’s what my try looked like:

Use a certificate – This one doesn’t apply to most people.  If you already have a digital certificate  you probably don’t need an explanation about this anyway.

Use an image – This is one of two options that will result in a signature on the page that actually looks like your signature.  The disadvantage to this one is that you need to sign a blank piece of paper, then scan it and save that signature image as a file on your computer (all of the common image formats are acceptable).  Then you just browse your computer to find that image file and select it for use as a signature.  If you sign a lot of PDF files, this might be the quickest way to get a real-looking signature, after you’ve completed the scan and save process:

Use a webcam – My favorite!  First you sign your name on a white piece of paper (I just used a regular 3×5 index card, on the blank side).

Then you click “Start Webcam” and just hold up your signed index card to the camera so it can read your signature.  You need to make sure the signature is on the blue line.  You also need to hold it still – I just rested my elbow on my desk while I held the signature card up to the camera.  When you like the way it looks in the preview box, click Accept.

When you click Accept, you are taken back to the PDF file itself, and you can drag the signature so that it sits exactly on the signature line (you should make sure that page is already displayed before you start creating the signature).  There are editing corners so you can make the signature larger or smaller if needed.

Now the document is signed!  At this point you can click “Signed. Proceed to Send” and then you have the option to send it by email through Adobe (requires an Adobe ID), or you can save a copy of the signed document to your computer (for your records) and then attach that to an email.

An important distinction to make here is that what we’ve done in the process above is create an electronic signature.  This is not a digital signature.  They might sound the same, but they are two different things.

An electronic signature is just that – your signature on a document, which you did electronically rather than signing the actual printed paper document.

A digital signature is done with a security certificate, meaning that it was verifiably signed by you and only you.  In most cases this is not really a requirement.  You might need to do that if you were signing documents to purchase real estate or some other situation where security is needed.

If you use Windows 8, you have probably become familiar with the thing called the Charms Bar.  Or at least you know what it is and where it resides (the right side of your screen).  When you put your cursor in the top right corner of the screen, the Charms Bar slides out from the right side with its “charms”.  Really they’re just icons, but Microsoft must have figured since they were changing everything else about Windows they might as well come up with some cutesy names for stuff we already know as something else.

(NOTE: For the record, I am highly recommending that you stick with Windows 7 for as long as possible, which could be through the year 2020 if you want (Microsoft will support it until at least that year).  But, I know that some of you already have Windows 8 computers so from time to time I will put up a tip that pertains specifically to that version of Windows.)

Not everyone likes the Windows 8 charms bar.  If you happen to inadvertently move your cursor to the top right corner, the charms bar is going to slide right out whether you want it to or not.  And not just that – at the same time there will be a big block in the lower left corner displaying the date and time, covering up whatever is on your desktop in that spot.

That’s what prompted my friend John to send me this email this past week:

Hi Scott – Is there a way to eliminate the charms bar in Windows 8.1 when you point the mouse to corner of the screen?  I still want it to work when I press Win + C on the keyboard.  I am not afraid to change values in the registry.  Thanks, John

Thanks John.  The good news is you don’t have to go into the registry to make this change.  For the average user, editing the registry can be a little scary because just one small mistake can really screw up the computer.

Instead, Microsoft has conveniently included a setting that allows you to turn that option on and off based on your preference.

Here’s how to disable the charms bar:

1. Do a right click on the taskbar (bottom of the screen) and choose Properties

2. Click on the “Navigation” tab and uncheck the first option in the “Corner navigation” section

3. Click OK

Now just check it by moving the cursor to the upper right corner.  You should be pleased to see no charms bar.

As John mentioned in his email, you can still make the charms bar pop up by holding down the Windows key and tapping the letter “c”.  This will work even after you disable the screen corner option.

Every once in a while I get a phone call from a frustrated computer user.  Their complaint?  The volume icon has disappeared!  Which means they can’t use the on-screen icon that normally allows them to raise or lower their speaker volume.  Where does it go?  And more importantly, how do you get it back?

As far as how it disappears, I can’t really tell you for sure.  Somehow the box gets unchecked.  It’s hard to imagine someone accidentally navigating to the place where that checkbox is and inadvertently unchecking it, then clicking OK – all without really being aware of what is going on.  More likely, some piece of software does it – whether by accident or design, who knows – and all of a sudden you can’t find the icon.

Of course,  there are often other ways to control volume:

But still, there’s nothing like the reassurance of having the little speaker icon in the System Tray, right where you always know you can find it.  Unless it’s not there.

Note: the steps listed for each of the Windows versions below are based on the assumption that the volume icon is missing because of a setting (a configuration issue), which is most often the case.  If you actually have some Windows files that have gotten corrupted or been deleted, the process would be more involved and you might not want to tackle this project yourself.

Here are some ways to get back your volume icon:

Windows 7 or Windows 8:

Windows Vista:

Windows XP:

If these steps don’t work, the fix is going to be a little more complicated and may involve editing the Registry.  The average computer user does not want to edit the Registry, since a mistake can really screw up the computer.  Take it to a trusted repair shop, or hire me to do it for you remotely.

When you create a Word document, you know exactly what you are typing.  So, you are obviously in full control of what appears on the pages of that document.  But did you know that Word “hides” some information in the document that doesn’t actually appear as text on any of the pages?  And this might not be information you want to make public.

You can check this out for yourself.  Go into your Documents folder, and open one of your Word files.  At first glance, all you see is the text that you put on the page.

But what do you find if you dig a little deeper?  You might see:

These are all items that are typically considered “behind the scenes” and not necessarily thing that you as the author want to make available to anyone that reads the file.

In Word 2010 and Word 2013, you can see all of that information by using the “Inspect Document” tool.  To do that, just open a Word document and click on File – Info.  In Word 2007, click the Office “orb” in the top left corner of the document, mouse over “Prepare” and click on Inspect Document.  Click the button called “Check for Issues” then click on Inspect Document.  You can check the boxes for the type(s) of information  you want to see, or just check all of them and see everything.

When the information is displayed, it looks something like this:

In some cases, you might not care if everyone is able to see this information.  But there are some situations where you would definitely not want these details to be made public.

For example, you might be writing a book and you send this file to a publisher.  You include a cover letter explaining that you have been working on this book for at least an hour a day for the last 2 weeks.  But when the publisher looks at the document information, he sees: Total editing time: 5 minutes.  That could be a little awkward to explain!

Or, you could be working on a document that will list you as the sole author.  But what if, as part of your writing process, you send it to your friend Vanessa to proofread?  She makes a few corrections and sends it back to you.  At that point, if you send that Word document to anyone else, they can look at the hidden details and they’ll see you and Vanessa BOTH listed as authors on this document.  That might raise a few questions about how much of this document you actually wrote.

Maybe you’re planning a trip, so you create a trip itinerary to use.  At the last minute, you decide to send out the itinerary to your friends and family, just to let them know where you will be on each day in case they need to get in touch with you.  But what you forgot was the fact that in the “Comments” part of the document you also noted each of your passport numbers and Social Security numbers so you would have easy access to that information.  Nothing wrong with that of course, except that you really don’t need all of your friends knowing these personal identity details.

There are other examples but you get the idea.  The point is, any document you create in Microsoft Word should be inspected and “cleaned” before you send it to someone else to read or review.  And this is even more true if you are publishing a Word document to be visible on the internet (a website can offer a Word document as a simple download link).

How do you remove your personal information from a Word document?  It’s actually pretty easy.

NOTE: this process will remove personal information from a Word document, but some of the other document properties will still be visible such as Total Editing Time.

In Word 2010 and 2013, click File – Info and then click the “Check for Issues” button.  That will give you a dropdown menu – in that menu, click on Inspect Document.  That brings up the Document Inspector window, which will have all of the options already checked:

Click the “Inspect” button, and it will quickly come up with a report.  As you can see, this particular document has some personal information that can be removed:

Just click the “Remove all” button.  Now, the same document shows these properties:

As you can see, some of the document properties are still there, but the personal information has been removed.

Obviously you might not want or need to do this with all of your Word documents, but I’ll bet there are certain instances where it would be a good idea.

Also – you might be interested to know that the process I described applies not only to Word, but to most MS Office programs, such as Excel and others.