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                     COMPUTING TIPS, TRICKS AND TRAPS 
          PLUS COMMENTS REGARDING ENVIRONMENTALLY SAFE COMPUTING
  1. —————————————————————
     Sometimes it takes months or years to stumble onto the ESSENTIAL 
     tips, tricks and traps with which every PC user should 
     become acquainted. Let's discuss a few of the more important 
     items which never seem to be covered adequately in the 
     instruction book which arrives with the computer. Many of these 
     tips apply to both laptops and desktop computers. If you are an 
     advanced user, glance at all of the tips - this tutorial 
     contains a sprinkling of basic, intermediate and advanced tips. 
     A little something for everyone! Let's begin....
        
     Don't experiment with ORIGINAL copies of your files! If you want 
     to tinker with a word processing file or slice and dice your 
     accounting data FIRST make a floppy or hard disk copy of the 
     file and then work on the COPY in case something goes wrong. 
     That way you will have the original to fall back on in case you 
     need it. 
     Don't buy floppy disks when the price is too good to believe. If 
     your data is worth anything at all, a few pennies more can make 
     the difference between having that important business letter 
     obtainable or a dreaded error message on the screen that your 
     file format is unreadable just when you needed that file at 3 
     AM. 
     Make backup copies of important files. If the data is REALLY 
     important, keep yet a second or third copy in a safe deposit box 
     in case your home or office burns down! Sounds a little severe, 
     but just wait until you discover the joy of doing your income 
     tax return on your PC (fantastic compared to the old pen and 
     pencil way) and then discover somehow the ONLY copy of the file 
     is no good when the IRS decides to perform a routine audit! 
     For backup you might want to switch from the COPY command to the 
     sensational DOS XCOPY command (available in DOS versions 3.2 and 
     later) which also allows file copying and backup using 
     additional parameter switches which you can read about in your 
     DOS manual. For example the /S switch used with XCOPY will copy 
     all files from your subdirectories to the new target disk. 
     Adding /P to XCOPY will cause a pause at each step to ask 
     whether you want each file copied. Using the /D switch followed 
     by a date will allow you to copy only those files created or 
     modified on that date or later. All three of these switches can 
     be used in tandem. 
     Here's a standard tip which is so simple most people overlook 
     it. Whenever you buy a box of new diskettes, FORMAT them 
     immediately. Why? Reason one: you will find out if any disks are 
     bad and be able to return to the store rather than be down to 
     your last (surprise: defective!) disk when you need it. Reason 
     two: usually you are right in the middle of a long word 
     processed document and need to save the file, but OOPS, your 
     current disk is full. No problem. Just reach into the desk 
     drawer and grab an empty floppy disk. SURPRISE! The floppy disk 
     is NOT FORMATTED which forces you to exit your word processor, 
     lose the data permanently from RAM memory, and format the disk 
     just as you should have in the first place. Beginners luck, I 
     guess. . . 
     Here's an extremely important tip most beginners should 
     consider: AT class computers and those containing a 80286 CPU 
     chip also contain a special battery to maintain the "setup 
     configuration." This battery will eventually die and thus 
     cause you to lose your important setup data. The first sign 
     that your battery is going are mysterious losses of time and 
     dates. Other "strange" data losses may start to occur. 
     
     Eventually your computer will even refuse to start! Preventative 
     maintenance suggests that you dig around on your DOS disk(s) and 
     locate the SETUP program. Run setup and when you see the 
     configuration report screen (lots of funny numbers and 
     settings), hit the SHIFT-PRTSC (Shift key and Print Screen key 
     pressed at the same time). This will force a printout of the 
     valuable setup data to paper. You can also obtain shareware and 
     commercial software programs that will store this data to disk.
     Most experienced users deal with the situation by making a 
     copy of this setup data onto a "safety disk." If your battery 
     dies, you will be able to quickly reconstruct the setup data 
     from your paper sheet or safety disk after replacing the battery 
     and running the setup program (or safety disk backup program.)
     
     A better method, of course, is to realize that the battery 
     contained inside the computer lasts for about 2 to 4 years 
     and simply keep a record (much like oil changes on your car) 
     and manually replace it well before the deadline. Of course 
     when you replace it, run the setup program and record the 
     setup data on paper, since once you remove the battery the 
     data will be lost from memory. You might investigate newer 
     battery systems which automatically recharge themselves from the 
     power source of the computer and thus never need replacement.
     
     IBM originally designed this feature, by the way, to supplant 
     the older "dip switch system" on the first PC's. In older 
     computers of the XT design, a user had to remove the PC cover and 
     carefully set tiny switches deep inside the computer whenever a 
     different circuit board or monitor system was used. This was 
     tedious, so the software equivalent of the tiny switches were 
     created in memory with settings stored by battery (when the 
     computer was shut down). This allowed users to change the setup 
     from the keyboard using the DOS setup program from the DOS disk 
     rather than removing the cover and fiddling with switches. The 
     downside is that now we must replace the battery periodically 
     and of course record the setup data on paper or disk. Technology 
     marches on!
     Here's an "insider's" tip power users are familiar with. When 
     working with long text or document files such as instructions 
     for shareware packages, business letters and other text files it 
     is frequently useful to extract small portions to a separate 
     file or print for future reference. Power users frequently use 
     the shareware program LIST which browses or displays these 
     documents and can "clip" screens using the frequently overlooked
     ALT-O key (press and hold ALT then hit O). Assuming LIST is 
     currently browsing your document, it will ask for the name of a 
     file to create which you may supply (e.g., custom.doc). List 
     will extract that single screen of data to the file. As you 
     continue browsing the document, hitting ALT-O will append or add 
     any additional screens to the special target file! When finished 
     you have a compact file of extracted text data which you can save, 
     print or edit with your word processor rather than wading 
     through endless screens of the lengthy master document! LIST 
     is available from all shareware vendors, many computer clubs and 
     individual users. Several shareware vendors are listed in the 
     tutorial on software.
     Want the ultimate simple database? Combine LIST with any simple 
     word processor or text editor. Using your word processor type in 
     any list of ideas, phone numbers, addresses, parts inventory 
     which needs to be tracked. Save the information on disk as an 
     ASCII (plain text) file. Load the file into LIST using the 
     appropriate command (e.g., LIST INFO.DOC) and use the high speed 
     search feature by pressing the F key (F for find) and enter a 
     search phrase to locate (e.g., Denver). List will locate that 
     phrase and the information near it very rapidly. Pressing the F3 
     key will take you to the NEXT occurrence of the same search 
     phrase. When finished, hit the HOME key to return to the top of 
     the document to begin a new search. Technically you could use 
     your word processor's search feature to locate information also, 
     but LIST is quicker and more flexible. To update your simple 
     database, periodically edit the master document with your word 
     processor to change, delete or update entries. 
     
     When you turn on your computer each morning does DOS greet you 
     with several prompts instead of one? Do you see:
     C>
     C>
     C>
     This is easy to fix since most beginners are unaware that 
     someone has probably tinkered with the AUTOEXEC.BAT file and 
     inadvertantly added a few extra carriage returns to the end of 
     the file by pressing the return key several times when the file 
     was orginally created and saved on disk. Simply load AUTOEXEC.BAT 
     back into your word processor and remove all (usually invisible) 
     lines and spaces and carriage returns at the end of the file 
     (use the delete key). Resave the file as ASCII text with the same 
     name and your problem should disappear.
     
     Beginners also need to know about the alternate keyboard. 
     Sometimes you need a special symbol like the cents sign, the 
     British currency (pounds sterling) symbol, or the one half 
     fraction sign. IBM compatable computers contain an "alternate 
     keyboard" system which allows access to special math, foreign 
     language and graphics symbols. The source is a special ASCII 
     chart printed in the appendix of your DOS manual as well as most 
     computer reference books. It's easy to use this system: while 
     you are in your word processor, DOS or other program, press AND 
     CONTINUOUSLY HOLD DOWN the Alt key and then USING ONLY THE 
     NUMBER KEYS ON THE NUMERIC KEYPAD (to the right of the keyboard, 
     not the normal number keys above the keyboard) hit the three 
     digit DECIMAL number code of the special character you need. 
     
     For example, from the ASCII table in the back of my DOS manual I 
     note that the symbol for the British currency Pound is decimal 
     code 156. I hold down the Alt key, press in sequence the three 
     numbers 156 on the numeric keypad and finally release the ALT 
     key to get the proper symbol on my screen. 
            
     There are many useful symbols for foreign languages, math, 
     fractions, foreign currency, symbols to draw boxes, lines and 
     useful graphics symbols. Note that these ASCII symbols will 
     usually display properly on your screen but MIGHT NOT print 
     properly on your printer since some are used for special control 
     codes and other activities. Many will, however, display on both 
     your screen and printer. 
     
     Jot down the codes for the most interesting ASCII symbols to 
     keep near your keyboard! By the way, PC-Magazine published a 
     shareware utility called ASC.COM several years ago (available 
     from many computer clubs and BBS systems) which can "pop up" 
     over many of your programs and display the full ASCII code table 
     for quick reference and handy use if you don't want to go 
     searching for the ASCII index in the back of your DOS manual. 
     
     Before leaving the discussion about the alternate keyboard, note 
     that crucial control of your printer - setting various typefaces 
     and features - can be provided via a combination of batch files 
     and use of the alternate keyboard. See the printer discussion at 
     the end of the batch file tutorial elsewhere on this disk.
     Absolutely lethal trick: If you get the message ABORT, RETRY 
     IGNORE? from DOS while you are attempting to copy files from 
     one drive or disk to another DO NOT EVER switch disks in the 
     target drive (i.e., the drive to which files will be sent) then 
     answer RETRY. 
     If you do, you will end up with a hopelessly scrambled mess on 
     the target disk if it already has important files in place. This 
     can occur, for example, when you try to copy files to a disk 
     which has a write protect tab in place. Your temptation might be 
     to insert another different disk and retry. However, when DOS 
     copies files, it first reads the directory of the target disk 
     and stores it in memory. If you switch disks, the in-memory copy 
     of the directory of the OLD disk will overwrite the directory of 
     the new disk. Best situation in this case is to answer abort and 
     rekey the operation again (shortcut with DOS is hit F3 to 
     automatically reissue the last command) then try another disk, 
     if necessary. There are other ways this dangerous situation might 
     arise besides a write protect tab, so be careful. 
     Don't install or change add-in circuit boards or cards within 
     your computer with the power on. And be extremely careful about 
     static electricity. Try to briefly touch a metal ground such as 
     a lamp or metal window frame to discharge stray static 
     electricity before you touch your fingers inside the PC. Static 
     electricity discharges can blow out one or several integrated 
     circuit chips and leave you with a repair bill of $300 or more! 
     If you ever see the message:    ARE YOU SURE (Y/N)?     always 
     answer no unless you really know what is going to happen next! 
     This message usually precedes disaster as DOS prepares to delete 
     all of the files on a floppy disk or format your hard drive and 
     wipe out all data. 
     Don't invite dumb power problems. You are typing the last draft 
     of a valuable client contract and your 30 foot long power cord 
     dangles in front of both family cats on its meandering way 
     across the middle of the living room carpet to the wall socket. 
     It is plugged into a rat's nest of four way plug adapters along 
     with high-current drawing air conditioners and toaster ovens. 
     This is a great way to send your data to toaster heaven while we 
     are on the subject. 
     Treat your hard drive with EXTREME tender loving care while it 
     is spinning. No bumps, jolts, slams or ramma-lamma-ding-dongs! 
     One little bump will send the read/write heads plowing into the 
     spinning disk surface. Kind of like a 747 jet crash into the 
     library of congress. Translation: large data catastrophe! 
     If your data is sensitive and you lock the keyboard with that 
     cute little key which slips into the front panel of your 
     machine, DON'T forget to remove the mouse or other input 
     devices. Since a mouse is an alternate input device, a savvy 
     user can easily direct the computer to spill forth its 
     information even while the keyboard is locked. 
     Use the DOS command DISKCOPY in ONLY two cases: to make a backup 
     copy of new commercial software OR when you have somehow damaged 
     a disk and want to work on it with the Norton utilities or some 
     other recovery program. For all other copies you are safer to use 
     the COPY or XCOPY command. Reason? DISKCOPY does not remove file 
     fragmentation which COPY does. Second reason? DISKCOPY can 
     attempt to copy good information onto a target disk sector which 
     has formatted bad or is otherwise unavailable to DOS. Use COPY 
     *.* to copy all files on a disk and you will simultaneously copy 
     everything and unfragment the files. Two operations for the 
     price of one! 
     Thunderstorm coming? Shut down the computer and unplug it from 
     the wall INCLUDING the modem or telephone line! LIghtning hits 
     to the power or phone line send very high voltages hurtling down 
     the wire. If you prefer you can leave the computer plugged in 
     and chose as to whether you wish your PC scrambled, sunnyside up 
     or just deep fried! 
     Never switch or remove disks in the middle of an aborted program 
     operation. If for some reason you get an error message in the 
     middle of a file copying session or disk writing operation, 
     don't swap in another disk! DOS may think the old disk is still 
     there and continue to write the remainder of the data over 
     something valuable on the new disk! Better to stop what you are 
     doing and issue a non-writing command such as VER or DIR or even 
     shut down the computer in extreme situations rather than mangle 
     two disks with misinformation. 
     Be careful using the DOS commands ASSIGN, FORMAT and RECOVER. 
     Especially if you are being a little too clever and change disk 
     drive letters with the DOS commands ASSIGN, JOIN and SUBST. What 
     happens is that you might temporarily rename your hard drive the 
     B: drive and then absent-mindedly try to format B: or recover B: 
     which will lead to a lot of deleted data on your hard drive. 
     Generally the RECOVER command is best removed from your DOS 
     subdirectory and never used. It is just too dangerous! 
     If you delete some files by accident, Norton Utilities, PC Tools 
     and several other utility programs can bring them back if you 
     are quick to use them and haven't created or changed any files 
     since the accident. Best to go out and get a copy of Norton, PC 
     Tools or a shareware unerase utility (e.g., Bakers Dozen) before 
     the need arises. Then practice using them on a dummy disk for 
     the likely day you need them. 
     Be careful when using the powerful DOS redirection and piping 
     commands discussed in our earlier DOS tutorial. 
     (example)     a>sort < this.doc   (sorts contents of this.doc on 
                                       column one and displays contents 
                                       on the monitor - a nice idea!) 
     (example)    a>sort > this.doc    (trashes any existing this.doc 
                                       and gives it a file length of 
                                       zero! Bad news!) 
     The same advice also applies to using the MORE command with 
     redirection arrows <  > since you can likewise wipe out data 
     files. Watch the direction of those cute little redirection 
     arrows! Same thing applies to using the redirection arrows when 
     you write batch files. Look at the sample line from a batch file 
     listing below: 
     (example)   ECHO -------->This message is important! 
     In the above example, DOS will erroneously think the little > 
     redirection symbol is telling it to create a file named THIS and 
     use ECHO to redirect text from that line of the batch file into 
     the file. A goofy, dangerous result! Another good boner is the 
     following batch file example: 
     (example) ECHO  Now use the c>prompt to return to DOS
     The above perfectly innocent batch file line creates a file 
     called PROMPT because DOS spots the > symbol and does what you 
     told it to do! 
     Instructions mean business! If program documentation says MUST 
     BE USED ON A COLOR MONITOR don't try to run it on your hercules 
     or monochrome system. Software can indeed destroy a monitor and 
     it only takes a second! Know what your monitor and display card 
     can handle and be SURE that the intended software matches 
     hardware capabilities. 
     If you suspect a business or individual may be illegally using a 
     commercial software package, for example buying one copy and then 
     installing MANY copies on various machines, you should report 
     the violation to the Software Publishers Association. Call 
     tollfree: 800/388-7478. SPA use of Federal and State law 
     enforcement methods is sudden and highly visible. The SPA is 
     quite aggressive on this point. The majority of calls received 
     by the SPA are from "whistleblowing" employees within a business 
     which is illegally using software. 
     If you use a RAMDISK to hold data be sure to stop every half 
     hour and copy the information into a more permanent floppy or 
     hard disk area in case of power failures. In fact every half 
     hour, check to see that your data from ANY program is 
     transferred to magnetic disk. No exceptions! 
     For those using the newer disks having 1.44 Meg and 720 K sizes 
     - those little plastic diskettes - don't swap and mix formats 
     willy nilly. Label the diskettes clearly and know the format 
     density (1.44M or 720K) with which you are working. 
     If data is sensitive and you want it GONE from snooping eyes, 
     use a utility like Norton's WIPEFILE to truly delete it from the 
     disk so an office curiosity seeker can't bring it back with an 
     unerase utility! 
     Likewise, some word processors create backup files having the 
     extension BAK. You may think you have deleted that sensitive 
     client proposal when a second document CLIENT.BAK also exists! 
     DOS manuals make reference to the VERIFY command. You can add 
     the /V switch to the COPY command to supposedly verify the 
     accuracy of the second file copy. Likewise you can turn VERIFY 
     ON and VERIFY OFF from within your AUTOEXEC.BAT file. 
     Unfortunately, the VERIFY command does a rudimentary CRC check 
     which can test only gross errors in file transfers. To be sure 
     the second copy is good, use the COMP command which, although 
     slow, is deadly reliable when you "gotta be sure." The FC 
     command found in MSDOS versions is even better and DOS manuals 
     discuss its use. Likewise use the DISKCOMP command whenever you 
     use DISKCOPY if you absolutely have to be certain that the 
     second diskette is PERFECTLY identical to the first. 
     
     Our next tip concerns computing devices and services to 
     assist the disabled:
     AbleData, Adaptive Equipment Dept, Newington Children's 
     Hospital, 181 E Cedar St, Newington, CT 06111 800/344-5405
     Accent on Information, POB 700, Bloomington, IL 61702
     309/378-2961.
     Apple Computer, Office of Special Educ. and Rehab., 20525 
     Mariani Ave. MS 43F, Cupertino, CA 95014  408/996-1010
     Closing the Gap, POB 68, Henderson, MN 56044  612/248-3294
     Direct Link of the Disabled, POB 1036, Solvang, CA 93463
     805/688-1603
     Easter Seals Systems Office, 5120 S. Hyde Park Blvd, Chicago, IL
     60615  312/667-8626
     IBM National Support Center for People with disabilities,
     POB 2150, Atlanta, GA 30055  800/426-2133
     Proceedings of Johns Hopkins National Search for Computing 
     Applications to Assist Persons with Disabilities. IEEE Computer 
     Society Press, 10662 Los Vaqueros Circle, POB 3014, Los 
     Alamitos, CA 90720-1264 
     American Foundation for the Blind, 15 W. 16th St, NY, NY 10011
     212/620-2000
     Trace Research and Devmpmnt, Univ of Wisconson, Madison Room S-
     151, Waisman Ctr, 1500 Highland Ave., Madison WI 53705
     608/262-6966
     National ALS Association, 21021 Ventura Blvd, Ste 321, Woodland 
     Hills, CA 91364  818/340-7500
     
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                      ENVIRONMENTALLY SAFE COMPUTING
  1. —————————————————————
     Computing has impacts on the earth and I would like to share a 
     few constructive suggestions and tips about saving resources and
     protecting the environment. 
     Computing uses paper. Keep two wastebaskets by your desk and
     recycle. Same for cardboard packing boxes and packing materials
     which arrive with computing equipment.
     But let's go a little deeper with the paper issue: Do you really 
     need to print on multiple part carbonless forms and heavyweight 
     computer paper? I use a lightweight 18# paper in my little dot 
     matrix printer. How about carbonless and two part forms? The 
     chemicals used in the manufacture of carbonless paper are toxic. 
     Do you really need a two part form (or 6 part form in the case of 
     some corporations which go wild with multipart forms?) Why not 
     see if a single part form can be made with a tear off stub or 
     perhaps a file saving feature in the software that traps the data 
     and saves it to disk for "your copy" of the form? Just like 
     banks: ask the customer if they want their checks back: meaning 
     does your customer need seven copies of a form or will your monthly 
     invoice statement cover the bill?
     
     Environmentally responsible computing also means ONLY upgrading 
     machines when you really need to or buying a used computer. Here's 
     why: the manufacture of integrated circuits used in computers uses 
     large amounts of concentrated acids, gasses and caustic chemicals. 
     These are stored, recycled or (hopefully) dumped into approved waste 
     sites in normal practice, but the point is do you really need 
     the latest machine and its impact on our planet given the toxic 
     nature of computer manufacturing processes? This package was 
     written on an XT class machine. I don't need anything better, 
     and when I do, I hope to find a USED "recycled" computer of 
     higher quality rather than buying a new one. Same with printers, 
     modems and so forth! Here in Seattle, several computer brokers 
     specialize in reselling used computers on consignment. Head that 
     direction for your next purchase! It's less expensive and helps 
     the planet! 
     As a commercial photographer by training, I use a Seattle film 
     lab for some of my photo processing. The lab uses an 8 1/2 by
     11 inch TWO part carbonless form to log in each order, they 
     later mail me a THREE part carbonless invoice for EACH order 
     within a few days by mail, then a final billing statement at 
     the end of the month AND they have 4 computer terminals in the 
     order processing customer counter area of the lab! I am sure 
     their accounting is extraordinarily well documented, but there 
     may not be enough trees on this earth to support this kind of 
     "information flow" if every business operated this way. I could 
     do with a small claim stub when I drop off my film, a little
     itemization printed on the paper envelope which contains the 
     finished order and perhaps a monthly statement printed on 
     recycled paper to summarize the account activity. The ironic 
     footnote is that the same lab has a sign prominently posted in 
     the lobby as to willingness to accept cardboard and plastic 
     (from things like film containers) for the benefit of the 
     environment! Clearly the right hand doesn't know what the left 
     hand is doing and sadly computers are pushing the waste factor 
     in this real life example.
     
     If you suspect I am beating the environmental drum too loudly, 
     back up and consider the financial COST to an operation like the 
     film lab mentioned above. Unwise from the financial end and 
     equally unwise from the environmental end.
     Computing uses electricity. If you are just stepping out of the 
     office for a half hour or so, it is probably best for the machine 
     to leave it on and the hard drive spinning to prevent the wear and 
     tear of machine startup which eventually wears out a hard drive.
     
     However, turn off the monitor if you are away for even short 
     periods using its own separate power switch (leaving the PC on) 
     even if you use screen blanker software since the monitor is 
     still drawing power! When should you turn off the machine 
     completely? Use the two hour rule: if you are away from the PC 
     NO MORE than two hours, leave the machine on. If away MORE than 
     two hours, shut it off. Also factor in the dust argument which 
     follows:
     
     Don't leave a PC on all night or LONG periods of time. The dust 
     sucked through your machine by constant fan use will more than 
     offset the savings in wear and tear you may gain by leaving the 
     hard drive spinning! The dust impacts the power supply which is 
     the heart of the system. If the power supply goes bad due to 
     overheating (because of a thick blanket of internal dust) it 
     can destroy your entire PC! For the curious or mechanically adept, 
     open the power supply WITH ALL APPROPRIATE PRECAUTIONS IN AN 
     UNPLUGGED AND COMPLETELY DISCHARGED MACHINE. You will be stunned 
     by the dust you see! I regularly take my pc and power supply cover 
     off and give the internals a LIGHT blast of compressed air (not 
     ozone-destroying freon) to free the dust and help the machine run 
     cooler. I do this every six months.
     Do a calculation for your office on your PC: how much wattage
     does an average PC in your office draw per hour? How many PC's
     in your office? What is the TOTAL economic cost leaving them ALL
     on during the night (12 hours?) versus turning them off? Now how 
     much a month, then how much a year. Finally, multiply by the cost
     per killowatt hour for cost per year. This doesn't even consider 
     maintenance savings or waste - just electricity!
            
     Plastics and computing are everywhere. Talk to a recycler and 
     see if they can accept polyethelene packing bags, stryrofoam 
     packing, printer cartridges and so forth. 
     
     If you are involved in large corporate purchases, ask the 
     vendor to supply a one page sheet describing how they use 
     LESS in an environmentally safe way in providing your computing 
     equipment needs (e.g., do they use popcorn from a growing 
     plant (which is now common) rather than styrofoam chips for 
     packing, do they recycle paper in their organization, etc.)? 
     Vendors just might take notice if large organizations asked 
     for a one page "computing impact statement" from each 
     computing supplies vendor. If your vendor doesn't know what 
     you mean by a "computing impact statement," send THIS 
     printout as an example and ask them again for their statement.
     
     Try to recharge printer ink cartridges if possible. Same with 
     laser printers. A nutty but workable method of recharging
     a FABRIC printer cartridge is to take it outside, lay it 
     on a piece of newspaper, pry off the plastic cartridge lid 
     and lightly spray the ribbon with the lubricant WD-40. Replace 
     the lid of the printer cartridge and allow a few hours for the 
     WD-40 oil to redistribute ink from the edges of the ribbon 
     (where the printhead does NOT strike the ribbon) to the center 
     strip of the ribbon. Recharged cartridges at the cost of a few 
     pennies of WD-40! This method works best with cloth fabric 
     ribbons not mylar ribbons, but I am told a few people have even 
     tried this with the mylar ribbons too. Professional ink and 
     ribbon recharge companies exist, investigate this option!
     Consider using shareware rather than commercial software. How 
     does this positively affect the environment? Simple. Shareware 
     uses simple packaging or NONE AT ALL since it frequently 
     travels electronically by BBS/modem methods, isn't returned to 
     the wholesaler to be sent to the garbage dump if too many 
     packages are manufactured, supports a small software programmer 
     who has less impact on the earth as a single human being rather 
     than a large corporation and provides you with high quality at 
     a fair price which goes well with the environmental features. 
     This isn't just a sales pitch, shareware DOES have less negative 
     impact on the environment than commercial software!
     Speaking of laser printers, the environmental cost and economic 
     cost is NOT favorable. Toner, paper, electricity, everything 
     about lasers is less favorable to the earth. Use a humble dot 
     matrix printer unless you are ready for the final draft. Lasers
     need more maintenance, too. Finally people are forever buying
     MORE plastic font cartridges and upgrades for lasers. 
     In this respect, a good compromise if you need laser quality and 
     sharpness in printing, is to consider using BUBBLEJET printers 
     which produce crisp "near laser" quality, but use far less ink, 
     plastic cartridge material and electricity than a conventional 
     laser printer. Most software packages now support bubblejet 
     printers.
     Back to the paper issue. Do you really need to send a memo or 
     submit a rough draft on paper? Can you get the boss to accept 
     the memo on disk and teach the boss how to use a simple file 
     browser to read the file? Pick up the phone and call with the 
     information, it is a faster, more human in scale and saves 
     resources.
     Let's talk about envelopes: if your office uses window style 
     envelopes for billings or mailings, try to design or use  
     window envelopes WITH EMPTY WINDOW OPENINGS RATHER THAN 
     CLEAR PLASTIC WINDOW OPENINGS. The billing address peeks out the 
     front just the same and becomes recyclable! Plastic containing
     envelopes cannot be recycled. Otherwise try to pre-print the
     address on the return envelope - anything but plastic windows.
     FAX processes are wonderful. Investigate FAXing onto disk (using 
     a FAX board installed in your computer) rather than paper 
     printouts of FAXES. This produces an electronic FAX file which 
     is saved on disk rather than printing on paper.
     Do you program or sell software? Why not recycle disks? Simply 
     slap your new label over that old disk no longer needed and add 
     a line that "this is a recycled disk" on the bottom of your disk 
     label or jacket. Most folks approve of greeting cards printed on 
     recycled paper. Do you really need to use a fresh new disk to 
     impress your client when a recycled one with a new label will do?
     Keep your keyboard, computer and printer clean. Once in a while
     vacuum or dust out the power supply which collects loads of dust.
     Reason: you prevent breakdowns which require repairs or scrapping 
     of the computer. End result: more earth resources used which 
     could have been prevented in the first place with a little
     preventative maintenance.
     Look at your software and documentation shelf. Stacks of old 
     computer magazines and documentation pile up! Have a once a 
     month PC recycling party where you rip out pages from 
     documentation and magazines you really need and recycle the 
     remains. Same goes for old disks, binders, the works.
     Donations. If computers help you make money, and they do, set 
     aside a small contribution to the non-profit group of your choice 
     which is involved in conservation and recycling. 
     Submit suggestions for this little part of the tutorial on "how 
     your office saves the earth using computers WISELY." I'll try to 
     insert it if valuable and of course, it will float all over the 
     world on BBS systems and shareware distribution points so your 
     small or large suggestion WILL possibly make a difference to 
     somebody in Brazil or China. This is a shareware package 
     which lives electronically on the Compuserve network which is 
     accessed by people all over the world! If possible, send your 
     suggestion on disk in ASCII using your word processor so I can 
     electronically merge it. 
            
     Don't compute when you don't need to! Sometimes it is too easy to 
     turn on the machine and bang out a spreadsheet or draft a memo.
     Can you solve the problem with your BRAIN or grab your rolodex to 
     find that phone number? Our brains our much more capable than 
     the most modern computer. What can you do better by leaving the 
     machine OFF and not using electricity, paper, plastic, ink and
     toner? Finally, turning off the computer means we spend a few
     minutes with each other, rather than our (let's face it) 
     addictive computers. You just may come up with a solution to 
     that budget problem by visiting with a colleague at the next desk 
     rather than recalculating that monster spreadsheet for the millionth
     time trying to find an optimum budget solution for the office.
     The vast majority of business problems are solved by CREATIVITY
     which organic brains do best! 
     Print (on paper, unfortunately) this little section of the 
     computer tutorial and place it on the company bulletin board. 
     This is a win/win situation: your co-workers will start to think 
     about earth conscious computing and if more beginners will use 
     PC-LEARN they will learn how to use a computer more efficiently 
     SOONER and thus WASTE LESS paper, electricity and natural 
     resources, does that make sense? Computer beginners can waste a 
     lot of paper, money, time and electricity learning how to use a 
     computer. If PC-LEARN helps them learn faster, then they should 
     waste less and become proficient more quickly! 
     Consider renting computer equipment for short term and special 
     projects. Obviously you can save money in most cases, but the 
     larger issue is that you don't impact the environment by using 
     resources for something you can share that computer equipment with 
     many other people via a rental arrangement.
            
     When you print lengthy documents from a disk to paper, 
     investigate clever software products (many of them shareware) 
     which allow you to print FOUR pages in tiny but readable 
     typeface and on BOTH SIDES of the paper. 
     Add your suggestion here or mail it to me. You do not need to be 
     a registered user to submit a suggestion to this section! 
     Suggestion from Mr. Bo Stiff, Charmichael, California . . .
     (Letter has been slightly edited and shortened)
     "A company I used to work for had a mainframe computer in 
     Connecticut with office hubs in Houston and LA. Approximately 40 
     reports were printed from a spooler set up to do this routine in 
     over 200 offices in the U.S. EVERY NIGHT! The company had a 
     guilty feeling about the environment so asked each office to 
     submit ideas." 
     "I suggested that they take the reports off line. Make them 
     available on demand only, put them on a screen with a 48 hour 
     hold on daily reports. 10 day old on weekly reports and 40 day 
     hold on monthly reports. Also suggested that when reports were 
     printed, NOT to send a blank page to set line space or formfeed. 
     This could be performed by the local office if needed. Obviously 
     the computers in the company were turned over to the controllers 
     who decided who got to see which reports and screens." 
     "Our initial calculations were staggering, then we found out 
     that we were one of the frugal offices! By our accountant's 
     calculations we cut back over 4000 cases of paper nationwide per 
     MONTH! Latest calculation is closer to 5000 cases." 
      
     Tutorial finished. Be sure to order your FOUR BONUS DISKS which 
     expand this software package with vital tools, updates and 
     additional tutorial material for laptop users! Send $20.00 to 
     Seattle Scientific Photography, Department LAP, PO Box 1506, 
     Mercer Island, WA 98040. Bonus disks shipped promptly! Some 
     portions of this software package use sections from the larger 
     PC-Learn tutorial system which you will also receive with your 
     order. Modifications, custom program versions, site and LAN 
     licenses of this package for business or corporate use are 
     possible, contact the author. This software is shareware - an 
     honor system which means TRY BEFORE YOU BUY. Press escape key to 
     return to menu. 
     
/data/webs/external/dokuwiki/data/pages/archive/computers/tips.txt · Last modified: 2001/11/08 10:19 by 127.0.0.1

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