Four useful Vista features

July 29th, 2008 Val

An article from Microsoft crossed my desk today, and I thought you might like to take a look. It give a quick description and even quicker “how to” on four useful features of Vista for families. Covered are the Windows Sidebar, Instant Search, the Windows Calendar, and Parental Controls. There are links in each section to more detailed articles on each one. Find the article by S.E. Slack on the Microsoft at Home site here:

http://www.microsoft.com/athome/moredone/windowsvista.mspx

And don’t forget, the Windows Vista course at LVS is now FREE starting August 11th!

Have fun!

Val P.

Posted in Windows Vista | No Comments »

Registration is open for CorelDRAW and FREE Vista classes!

July 28th, 2008 Val

September registration is now open at LVS Online Classes!

FREE Windows and Vista classes!

New for the Fall session, the Windows Vista class is now FREE. The Intro to Windows (XP and previous versions) is still free as well. These courses are set up for the first time computer user, but long time users will still learn something or your money back! ;) You’ll still need to sign up for a student account with LVS, but there is NO CHARGE for this process, and you won’t be hassled with Spam for the rest of your life, though you may choose to get announcements from LVS if you want them. These courses DO include instructor support for all six lessons and a forum to ask questions. You can work at the six lessons at your own speed as well. What more could you ask from a free course?

NEW CorelDRAW X4 Introduction Part 1

The new introductory course for CorelDRAW X4 is also available for this session. It has been completely re-written from the old X3 classes and split into two classes to cover all that material as well as the new features in X4. If you took the old version 12 or X3 class, you know it packed a LOT into six lessons. Most folks had trouble finishing the class in six weeks, so I’ve made the adjustment many folks have asked for! The second, Part 2, class will be available in November, right after this session ends. Don’t worry, Part 1 is still chocked full of good information, lots of exercises, and plenty of new screen shots as well as being updated to X4. You’ll have just about everything you need to keep going at the end of the term. Part 2 will look at more of the tools and effects we didn’t get to cover in Part 1 as well as many more practical applications.

Classrooms will open on Aug. 25, 2008. Registration ends on Aug. 27, 2008. The first lesson will post on Aug. 30, 2008. I hope to see you there!

Have fun!

Val P.

Posted in CorelDRAW, CorelDRAW Intro, Windows Vista | No Comments »

Vista virtual folders - great for asset management

July 24th, 2008 Val

Once you’ve gotten started with CorelDRAW or any other graphics program, you quickly end up with hundreds or thousands of files on your hard drive. Even if you are very organized in your file structure, there will be times when you know you have a picture of a fire truck somewhere, but just can’t find it. There are two tools in Vista and somewhat less so in XP to help you.

1. Whenever you save a file, take the extra moment or two to add keywords or tags to your file. These could be descriptions of the image, the client’s name, or what city the photo was taken in. Add as many as you can think of that might give you a clue what is in that image.

2. Once you have tags or keywords, you can search on those terms in either Windows XP or Vista. Vista takes it one step farther by allowing you to save searches. These saved searches then become “virtual folders” and are marked by blue folders rather than the normal yellow ones. Our firetruck image might be saved in a virtual folder called “vehicles” and one called “rescue” and one called “Jones Trucks”, but the file in those virtual folders is really just a shortcut to the real file you saved originally. These extra folders don’t use a whole bunch of memory. Even better, when you save a new file that has one of those tags or matches the search in some other way, it gets added automatically to the corresponding virtual folders. You don’t have to do anything more besides giving your files reasonable tags.

If you’d like more information on Virtual Folders, there’s an article that just came out today from CNET.

http://help.cnet.com/9602-12576_39-0.html?messageID=2510953&tag=nl.e410

I apologize for my lack of posts lately. I’ve been moving my belongings across town to a new home and have been just a bit tied up.

Have fun!

Val P.

Posted in Windows Vista | No Comments »

SP1 and AVG

July 6th, 2008 Val

I had no problems downloading and installing SP1 for X4. Haven’t had time to play with it as the big move is happening this Thursday. However, I will tell you that some folks are having problems installing it if they are using the AVG anti-virus program. The only fix anyone has found is to UNINSTALL AVG before you install SP1, then re-install AVG. The safe way to do that is to download SP1 and save it to your hard drive. Disconnect temporarily from the internet (use the Control Panel if you’re on a Broadband connection), uninstall AVG, install SP1, re-install AVG, re-connect to the internet.

Have fun!

Val P.

Posted in CorelDRAW | No Comments »