Computer Tips

TERMINOLOGY
If you are fairly new to computers you may think you know what these terms mean. Read them and you might find that you don't.

Computer - The box with the on/off switch and slots to put disks in. Anything not physically inside that box is not a computer. Don't point to your monitor and say, "That's my computer." It's not.

Monitor - The TV thing you see stuff in. A monitor is not a computer. It is an output device. It outputs information from the computer so you can see it.

Keyboard - The thing you type on. It is not a computer. It is an input device used to put data in the computer.

Mouse - The little oblong thing with buttons that you click, a roller on the bottom and a wire that plugs in the back of the computer. It will always have at least 2 buttons, a left one and a right one. It is an input device. More than one computer mouse are called mice or mouses...no one knows for sure. A mouse (notice that I'm trying not to use the plural cause I don't know how) may not have a roller on the bottom.....it may be an optical mouse.

Printer - The thing that prints. It is a peripheral that plugs in to the computer. It is an output device used to display (output) data from the computer.

USB - Stands for Universal Serial Bus, and is a port on a computer that allows external devices to be connected simply and easily. USB is a relatively new standard for peripheral connection, however the benefits of simple installation and high-speed data transfer make it an attractive option. All new home computers now come with USB ports built in.

USB Flash Drive - A USB Flash Drive is essentially NAND-type flash memory integrated with a USB 1.1 or 2.0 interface used as a small, lightweight, removable data storage device. USB flash drives are also known as "pen drives", "chip sticks", "thumb drives", "flash drives", "USB keys", and a wide variety of other names.

Program (application) - Set of instructions that you use to tell the computer what to do. A Word Processor (Ex. Microsoft Word) is a program. You use a program to send email and so on. The computer won't do anything without a program to tell it what to do. When you open a program you see a graphical user interface (GUI) on the screen..... yes, it's called a GUI.....really. Everything you see on your screen is a graphic (picture). A GUI allows you to see and use the instructions in a way humans can understand. In other words, the "user" uses "graphics" to "interface" with the programs.

Firewall - A firewall is a hardware or software solution to enforce security policies. In the physical security analogy, a firewall is equivalent to a door lock on a perimeter door or on a door to a room inside of the building - it permits only authorized users such as those with a key or access card to enter. A firewall has built-in filters that can disallow unauthorized or potentially dangerous material from entering the system. It also logs attempted intrusions.

Click here to download Free Firewall software from PCWorld.com: ZoneAlarm Free 5.5

For more information about ZoneAlarm - Click Here

Malware - Short for malicious software, software designed specifically to damage or disrupt a system, such as a virus or a Trojan horse.

Trojan Horse - A Trojan is a program that enters your computer undetected, giving the attacker who planted the Trojan unrestricted access to the data stored on your computer. Trojans can transmit credit card information and other confidential data in the background. Trojans are often not caught by virus scanning engines, because these are focused on viruses, not Trojans. Catching such threats would require the use of a Trojan scanner (a.k.a Trojan cleaner, Trojan remover, anti-Trojan).

Click here to download Free Trojan and Malware removal software from Emsisoft: a-squared (a2)

For more information about a-squared (a2) - Click Here

Virus - A self-replicating program that spreads by inserting copies of itself into other executable code or documents. Thus, a computer virus behaves in a way similar to a biological virus, which spreads by inserting itself into living cells. Extending the analogy, the insertion of the virus into a program is termed infection, and the infected file (or executable code that is not part of a file) is called a host.

Popup Blocker - A small, effective, and intelligent anti-popup software product than can kill annoying popup windows and usually resides in the system tray in the bottom right corner (near the clock) on your PC.

Click here to download Free Popup Blocker software from Panicware: Popup Stopper Free Edition 3.1.14

For more information about Popup Stopper - Click Here

Spyware - Spyware often installs as a third-party component bundled with a freeware or shareware application, just like adware, making the distinction between the two somewhat vague. Spyware includes code used to gather and transmit information about the user or his or her behavior to a third party. This statistical data often is collected without the knowledge or consent of the user.

Click here to download Free Spyware and Adware removal software from Lavasoft: Ad-Aware SE Personal

For more information about Ad-Aware - Click Here

Click - To tap one of the mouse buttons. If clicking doesn't work, try 2 quick taps (double-click). In some instructions, click may mean double-click. If one click doesn't work, try double-clicking. Some mice....mouses....whatever, have more than 2 buttons.

Right-Click - Clicking the right mouse button while your pointer is resting on something (an icon or whatever) will almost always give you a menu that affects whatever your pointer is resting on. For instance, you can almost always delete something by right-clicking on it and choosing "Delete" from the menu that appears. Same with "Copy" and "Paste" and other options depending on what you right-click on.

Windows - Windows is an OS (operating system). It gives you tools and commands to use on your computer in the form of pictures you can click on so you don't have to type C:dir*My Documents/My Pictures/;del:tr/get*back,,comattrib,>disprt at the dos prompt in order to instruct your computer to open a program.

XP - The latest version of Windows. It allows you to say, "I have the latest version of Windows." It can be configured to look and work just like the older versions of Windows.

Desktop - When your computer is on, and no programs are open, you are looking at your Desktop.

Resolution (screen resolution) - The screen is the front of your TV thing. It shows you pictures and stuff by making little dots glow in different colors. There are a lot of dots on there. The dots are called pixels. Older computers had a screen resolution of 640X480. Then came 800X600. Newer ones are 1024X756. They're getting bigger every year. That's why you might have to scroll to the right to see all of some websites that were created to be viewed at higher resolutions than yours.

Bytes and Bits - Bytes are pieces of information. We refer to bytes in the thousands (kilo) or millions (meg) or billions (gig). You may have a 20 gig hard drive. It will store 20 billion bytes of information. You may have 256 megs of ram that will keep 256 million bytes of information at the ready instead of having to search your hard drive for it. You may have a picture or text file saved in a folder that is 30 kb in size. You may have a 56k dialup internet connection which means 56 thousand bits of information can come from the internet into your computer every second. Get broadband.

Broadband - A very fast internet connection. That's all......that's all it means....don't try to get fancy with the definition. It just means fast download and upload speeds. Webpages load almost immediately, files that take an hour to download with a dialup connection only take a few minutes with broadband. Cable and DSL (digital subscriber line) are broadband connections. With a broadband connection you never have to logon to the internet - your computer is always connected to the internet....unless you have AOL (that's another story).

Hard Drive - If you remove the hard drive from your computer you will have a computer without a hard drive in it. All the information in your computer is on your hard drive....well, sorta. There was a time, not so long ago, when a great hard drive could store 250 megs of information (bytes) or files. A lot of animals that were alive then are extinct now. Windows XP is bigger than that and wouldn't fit on one of those old ones. Today, new computers come with, at least, 20 gig hard drives. Every time you save something it gets stored on your hard drive. An operating system (like Windows), 4 or 5 big games, Microsoft Office, a graphics editor, your grandmother's genealogy program (made out of bytes) can start filling up a hard drive pretty fast. So, the bigger your hard drive, the better.

Ram - (random access memory) Some chips (called memory sticks) that scoop some information off the hard drive and hold it out front for quick use so the computer doesn't have to search through the hard drive so much. It only scoops up stuff related to what you're doing at the time. You can't have too much ram and you never have enough. Buy more, more, more....it's cheap and just plugs into the motherboard. You can easily install it yourself.

Motherboard - If you picture a computer repair man with a soldering iron and little wires and resisters and capacitors and stuff, forget it. Nowadays, everything in there is a component....if it goes bad you pull it out and stick in a new one. If you have a 1/4 inch nut runner and a Phillips screwdriver you can fix anything that goes wrong with your computer. Most things in there are held in place by one screw. Just take off the case, pull out every thing that's plugged into the slots in the motherboard and throw it away, then replace it all with new stuff. Of course, I would never do that.

Video card - A video card is a plug in circuit board that makes the video work. Video cards have those meg things we talked about. More megs equal better display on your monitor. I have some old computers with 2 meg video cards. If you don't play games, they're fine but newer computers come with at least 32 meg cards which show pictures in much better detail. If your video card goes bad, pull it out and stick in a new one. How do you know which card it is? It's the one your monitor plugs into.

Sound card - Like the video card but for sound....it's the one your speakers plug into. If it goes bad pull it out and put in a new one....hey...changing these cards is easy...if you think you have a bad one just do it.

Modem - Another card. It's the one your phone plugs into. It allows you to connect to the internet at a speed 3 times slower than cold molasses.

LAN card (Ethernet card/NIC) - Another card. It allows you to use broadband to connect to the internet. It also allows you to connect several computers together in a network. They range in price from about $10 to $200. The ten dollar one works fine.

Software - Computer programs.

Hardware - Physical components of your PC and its peripherals.

Files and folders - Let's say you have a file cabinet with only one drawer. You want to see the files from the Jones account. You open the drawer, choose the folder for Jones and in it you find all the Jones files. Each letter, picture, invoice, every piece of paper in that folder is a file. If you want to add a file to the Jones folder, don't just shove it in the drawer. Make sure you put it the Jones folder or you will have a hard time finding it again. Computers are file cabinets with one drawer. When you turn your computer on you have opened the drawer. Inside the drawer you see folders. Inside the folders you see files. Each letter, picture, everything you save and all the different instructions that make up programs are files.

Path - Everything on my computer is on my hard drive. The name of my hard drive is "C:" The name of my OS is "Windows." I have a folder named "Vacation" on my "Desktop." In that folder is the picture (file) named "Beach" (same one). If someone was using my computer and asked me where my beach vacation pictures were I would tell them the path is C:/windows/desktop/vacation/beach. Someday you may run across something that requires you to use paths. You probably won't know how.

Save - Save As - You just typed a letter in WordPad. You're finished with it and it's time to save it. In WordPad, click "File." In the menu that appears click "Save As." " A box named "Save As" will appear. Near the top of the box will be a field (white area with type in it) with the words "Save in" at the left of it. In that field will be the name of a folder. What you're saving is going to be saved in that folder. If you don't want it saved in that folder then click the little arrow button (looks like a tiny upside down triangle) at the right of that field. Choose the folder you want to save it in. Now......near the bottom of the box is a field named "File name." Type the name you want it to have or keep the name that is already there. Now you can click on the "Save' button. If you download something from the internet you're going to see the same "Save As" box. Use it correctly and you will never lose a file. So, when do you use just plain "Save?" If you open an existing file, that's already saved in the folder where you want it, and you make some changes, you can use just plain "Save" to save the changes. The file will remain in the folder you opened it from and will keep the same name.