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Brandon Florida
New Wave Leads Group of Brandon, Florida
Neighborhood Lifestyles-December 1997
Article by Diane Wood
Most people look forward to Wednesday because it's 'hump' day and a clear indication that the weekend is not far off. However, the "New Wave" Leads Group celebrates Wednesday mornings with an aromatic cup of coffee and breakfast at the cozy Mocha Bay Coffee Cafe.
The atmosphere feels like home, but 18 or more primarily small business professionals settle into comfortable chairs or a sofa with profits on their minds. Facilitator Woody Aldrich calls the group to order as each member gives a brief introduction of themselves and their businesses.
Next comes group business and a 10-minute presentation by one of the members providing handouts and a more in-depth business profile.
The meeting adjourns for private networking after each member has the opportunity to thank fellow "New Wavers" for leads provided.
Members enjoy the benefit of "occupational exclusivity,' as only one professional from each business category is permitted to join the club. However, if an occupational category is currently filled, you may sign up on a waiting list and be invited once the position becomes vacant for any reason.
Membership dues are $25.00 annually and regular attendance is required to maintain your occupational seat in the group.
Please call Dale Wiley at 813 634-9513 for Information.
The New Wave Leads Group meets 8 a.m. every Wednesday.
New Wave Leads Group, Brandon, Florida
November 16, 1998
Tampa Tribune, Tampa, Florida
Frank Ruiz's Weekly Technology Column
Thanks to Frank Ruiz for inclusion of this
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URL in his weekly list of Favorite Web Sites!
Restarting Windows 95 Without Rebooting Your Entire System
Choose Shut Down in the Start menu, select Restart the computer?, then hold down Shift as you click Yes.
Want an icon that does all this without ever setting foot in the Shut Down dialog box? Just set up a simple MS-DOS batch file and place its icon within arm's reach. From then on, restarting Windows 95 is just a double-click away.
Open Notepad and type the following: @EXIT
Save the file anywhere you want with an appropriate name, such as RESTART.BAT, and close Notepad. Find the new file in Explorer and place a shortcut to it on the desktop (assuming you want to access this icon from the desktop). Close Explorer and rename the new shortcut.
Click the shortcut with the right mouse button, choose Properties, and on the Program tab, select the Close on Exit option. Click Advanced, select MS-DOS mode, and deselect Warn before entering MS-DOS mode. Click OK twice.
Ready to restart Windows 95? Double-click your new desktop icon!
PREPARE FOR EMERGENCIES
If you have a Windows 95 installation CD, you can create an Emergency Recovery disk to help you recover important files in the event of a disaster. Once created, this disk includes system and configuration files, plus the Emergency Recovery Utility, the program that restores these files to your system.
Navigate your way to the OTHER\ MISC\ERU folder on the CD and double-click ERU.EXE. Then just follow along as Windows 95 walks you through the disk-creation process. (You can save the recovery files on a disk or a drive, such as on a network.) When the setup program finishes copying the files, you'll see a box of instructions for using the disk in the event of a disaster.
FAKE THE AUTOPLAY
Do you have a CD-ROM drive without AutoPlay capability? (Meaning, when you pop an audio
CD into the drive, it doesn't play automatically.)
You can't add this feature, but you can get one step closer to it. Whereas you normally
have to open the CD Player and press Play, you can set the CD Player to automatically play
your audio CD when you open this program.
Open Explorer and navigate your way to the shortcut you use to start the CD Player. Right-mouse click it and select Properties. Place your cursor at the end of the text on the Target line, type a space, and then type: "/PLAY" (without the quotes). Click OK. To test out your handiwork, insert an audio CD, start the CD Player using the shortcut whose target line you just changed, and listen up!
REMOVING SPECIFIC ITEMS FROM THE DOCUMENTS MENU
Have you ever wanted to only remove some of the documents from the Documents menu and
not all of them? To do so, open Windows Explorer, pull down the View menu, and select the
Options... command. When the Options dialog box appears, select the Show all files radio
button, then click OK to close the dialog box. Next, open the Windows\Recent
folder. Now, to remove an item from the Documents menu, simply delete it from the recent
folder in Windows Explorer. When you do, the Documents menu will reflect only those items
that are remaining in the Recent folder. If you plan to routinely perform this task, you
may want to create a shortcut to the Recent folder on your desktop.
FIXING LOST FILE ASSOCIATIONS
If you accidentally associate a particular file extension with the wrong application, don't try to fix it from within Windows Explorer's File types dialog box--there's no way to remove a single extension from a registered file type without deleting the entire entry and starting over. Instead, use Windows 95's version of the Windows 3.x File Manager, which you can launch from the Run dialog box by typing winfile and pressing [Enter]. Once File Manager opens, pull down the File menu and select the Associate... command. When the Associate dialog box appears, type the extension that you want to get rid of in the Files with Extension text box. When you do, you'll see the errant file association appear in the Associate With text box. To remove the file association, scroll to the top of the list of file types, select (None), and then click OK.
SELECT FILES BY DRAGGING AROUND THEM
You can select a group of adjacent files by clicking and dragging a box around them with your mouse. When you release your mouse button, Windows Explorer selects all files within the box.
STARTUP-LESS STARTUP
When Windows 95 loads, it loads every application whose shortcut you've placed in the StartUp folder (in your Start menu under Programs). Occasionally, however, you may not want these applications to load, although you don't want to go so far as to remove them from the StartUp folder. In that case, tell Windows 95 to avoid loading them during that startup only. When you see the Windows 95 logo on-screen, hold down Shift until the operating system finishes loading, and then let go. Those StartUp applications are nowhere to be found!
SORTING THE DETAILS
The Details view in Windows Explorer or My Computer reveals four columns of information about each file in a folder. These columns list each file's name, size, type and date of last modification. This view also allows you to easily sort your files by any one of the columns. For example, to sort your files according to date, click the title bar for the date column. To arrange your file information in reverse (descending) order, click the title bar twice.
Here is a great site for many things related to those annoying things in Windows!
www.annoyances.org/
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Recycle Your Letters
Most people don't reinvent the wheel with each piece of business correspondence. If you want to reuse the format and/or text of an existing letter, Word 97's Letter Wizard makes it easy. Open the document you want to emulate, then select Tools/Letter Wizard from the menu bar. When applied to an existing letter, the Letter Wizard "reads" the document and displays a tabbed dialog box that lets you change only the key parts of the letter (such as the sender and recipient info). You aren't forced through every step of the Wizard.
Navigate Long Documents
Don't mess around with the scroll bar any more than necessary. If you're looking at a document that's 20 pages or longer, it's much faster to use the Document Map.
1. Select View/Document Map from the menu bar to bring up a scrolling outline of the document.
2. To reduce the Document Map to main headings, right-click in the map and select
Show Heading 1
3. Scroll down the map (it's now much faster) until you find what you're looking for. Click it to zoom right there in the editing window.
4. To turn off Document Map, right-click in the map and select the top Document Map option.
Save File Space
Word 97 has a new file format that lets it store additional information, such as hyperlinks. But these capabilities come at a price: Word 97 files are twice the size of identical Word 6.0 or Word 95 files. If you don't need links in your documents, select File/Save As from the menu bar and choose Word 6.0/95 or the even more compact Rich Text Format (RTF). To save in this format every time, select File/Save As from the menu bar, click the Options button, and specify your choice under "Save Word files as."
Word can print an address on an envelope. Delivery and return addresses can contain
text, graphic images, and barcodes, which streamline the postal routing process. If your
printer can print graphics, Word can print two types of codes on an envelope: the POSTNET
barcode, which is a machine-readable representation of a U.S. ZIP Code and the delivery
address; and the FIM-A code, which identifies the front of a courtesy reply envelope. In
addition to printing a single envelope, you can print a large number of envelopes with
different addresses by merging documents.
Address and print an envelope
1 On the Tools menu, click Envelopes and Labels, and then click the Envelopes tab.
2 Enter the address information, and then select the options you want.
To format the address, select the address text, right-click it, and then click Font on the shortcut menu.
3 To select an envelope size, the type of paper feed, and other options, click Options.
4 To print the envelope, insert the envelope in the printer as shown in the Feed box, and
then click Print.
To add the envelope as a separate section at the beginning of the document, click Add
To Document. To change an existing envelope that's already a section in a document, click
Change Document. You can print the envelope when you print the document.
Note You can create a default return address that appears on all envelopes you print, or
you can include a logo or other graphic images with your return address.
Print a delivery point address or FIM-A code on an envelope
1 On the Tools menu, click Envelopes and Labels, and then click the Envelopes tab.
2 Click Options.
3 Click the Envelope Options tab.
4 To have Word print a machine-readable representation of the U.S. ZIP Code under the
delivery address, select the Delivery point barcode check box.
To have Word print a mark on courtesy reply mail that identifies the envelope during presorting, select the FIM-A courtesy reply mail check box.
Tip The Envelopes and Labels command prints only FIM-A codes. If you need to print FIM-C codes, which are sometimes used for bulk mail, use the BARCODE field.
1. Find Chart Tips
2. Put Art In Your Charts
3. Rotate Column Headers
4. Lay Out Text Smoothly
5. Make Ideal Indentations
1. Find Chart Tips
Beneath any element of an Excel 97 chart, there's a wealth of information. To access it, simply move your mouse cursor over the data point you're interested in. Chart Tips pop up automatically to identify the different components of the chart.
2. Put Art In Your Charts
Want to add an impressive background to an Excel bar or line chart? The option exists, and the effects can be stunning.
1. Right-click the plot area (the part behind the data points), and select Format Plot Area.
2. Under the Patterns tab, click the Fill Effects button and experiment with the options under the Gradient, Texture, and Patterns tabs. You can even import a photograph or other graphic under the Picture tab.
3. Once you've gotten the desired effect, click OK twice.
3. Rotate Column Headers
Column headers never seem to fit the way you want them to. But you can solve this problem using Excel 97's new Rotate Text tool.
1. Select the cells containing the column headers.
2. Right-click the selection, then pick Format Cells.
3. Click the Alignment tab and set Orientation to 45 degrees.
4. Click OK, and you're set.
4. Lay Out Text Smoothly
Use the Merge Cells tool in Excel 97 to smoothly display blocks of text in a spreadsheet.
1. Select the group of cells where you want the text to appear, and right-click to bring up the shortcut menu.
2. Choose Format Cells.
3. Select the Alignment tab and click the Wrap Text and Merge Cells options. Now the text will smoothly fill the merged cells without spilling over into adjacent cells.
5. Make Ideal Indentations
Excel 97's new indent feature opens up many formatting options, including outline-style multiple indentation. (You can indent as many as 16 levels.) To indent a range of cells, select them and click the Increase Indent button in the toolbar. To indent one cell in the range more than the others--to form a hanging indent--select that cell and click the Increase Indent button again.
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