No Wireless Networks Available in Windows 7?

One problem I have run into on several Windows 7 machines is not getting any wireless networks when I go to the wireless network manager! Usually, when you click on Network icon in the task bar, you get a list of wireless networks and then just connect.
However, there are times when you will see the message “No wireless networks available”, which makes no sense because the day before you may have seen 15 wireless networks while in your apartment or wherever. There are also some instances where a few wireless networks show up, but not all networks that you know exist. That’s a slightly different problem, but one that I’ll address too.

Basically, there are a few things you can try which normally fix the issue. It’s not a bug or anything like that, but it can be really frustrating if you don’t know what’s causing the problem. Below I will walk though the various steps you can take to resolve the missing wireless networks issue.

Power Off/On Modem, Router, Computer

You’ve probably heard this one a thousands times, but it actually does work sometimes! Go ahead and turn off your modem, router and computer. Then power up your modem, wait 1 minute, then power up the router, again wait 1 minute and then power up the computer. It’s really simple and rebooting is a magical savior a lot of times.

Update Drivers/Firmware

Next up are drivers. Make sure you have the latest driver for your network card and also the latest firmware for your router. With all the new fancy wireless routers coming out these days, you need to make sure you have the latest drivers to keep up.
Another issue here is to try and use Windows Update first to update the network driver if you can. Sometimes the one from Microsoft works and the one from the manufacturer does not, so try both.

Ensure SSID Broadcast

If you don’t see the wireless network name listed in your wireless list, it also could simply be because SSID broadcast has been disabled on the router. Log into the router and make sure that SSID broadcast is turned on.

Reset Wireless Router

If you had somebody setup your router, you never know what kind of security settings they may have turned on. For example, some people turn on MAC Address Filtering, which only allows computers whose MAC address is listed to connect to the network. Other settings like 2 GHz and 5 GHz can cause issues. In this case, just go ahead and perform a full reset of your router.
You can normally do that by pressing the reset button on the back of the router, which will bring the device back to default settings and remove any passwords, etc.

WEP vs WPA/WPA2

This is actually a big issue that causes a lot of problems because people have older computers and laptops that used to run Windows XP, but now are loaded with Windows 7. Everything works great, but your network card may not support newer protocols like WPA2 with AES encryption. If you have no idea what any of that means, basically WEP is the simplest security protocol and will normally work with old hardware too.
If your wireless router says WPA or WPA2 under wireless security and you can’t see the network on your computer, try changing it to WEP and see if it shows up then. If it does, then you have up update your network card or work with the less secure WPA protocol.
And it’s useful to note that you have to change the WEP/WPA settings on both the router and the computer. But normally, once you change it on the router, the computer will automatically figure it out.

Sleep/Hibernate Problems

If you can’t connect to wireless networks after coming back from sleep mode or hibernate, then it could be that you have to adjust your power settings. Basically, go to your power profile (Balanced, etc) and click on Change Plan Settings. Click on Wireless Adapter Settings and then choose Maximum Performance.

Uninstall Adapter

Another thing you can try is to uninstall the wireless adapter from your computer by going to Device Manager and then rebooting the computer. When Windows loads up, it will normally “find” the hardware again and re-install it, which may fix the issue.

Email Photos, Text and Links to Yourself the Easy Way

Before services like Dropbox and Box, most of us archived files we needed in multiple places by emailing them to ourselves. With Gmail’s filtering system, we still email link and other information to ourselves to read or tackle later. This method creates a to-do list we must face every day when we check our email.
If, like us, you email a great deal of information to yourself, then cc:to me is a must-install bookmarklet.

On the far right of the page is a blue box labeled Get Started. Enter your email address, then click Continue.




CC:to me then creates an account page for you. If you want to also text emails to yourself, enter your cell number, then click Update.




Next. drag the bookmarklet to your browser’s bookmarks bar.



Navigate to any website, then click the bookmarklet in your browser.



A small window opens to your right. Drag photos from the website to the window, or paste text or links in the blank space. Click Send when finished.




CC:to me then emails the information to your email address. You can then use the information later, or archive it for a future date. Messages come from mail@cctome.com, so make sure your spam filter is set to accept messages from cctome.com.
We like that CC:to me makes it emailing yourself information quicker, and the texting feature is nice too. In our tests, the bookmarklet worked very well in Firefox, but not so well in Internet Explorer and Chrome. As this is a very new service, it is our hope functionality for other browsers will be improved soon. CC:to me plans to add pro accounts in the near future. According to their website, the service plans to add the ability to save notes to Dropbox.

Most Expensive Computers in the World

#1. DECADENT DISPLAY (Price – $8,00,000)

DECADENT DISPLAY is the Worlds Most Expensive Computer worth $800,000. Its loaded with features like 9X Media provide a jaw dropping display of multi-screens which offers combinations of 64 HD screens.



#2. TRUVIA EPC (Price – $55,000)




Truvia EPC is one of the Worlds Most Expensive Computers worth over $55,000 which is a hand crafted PC. These are tailor made and can be designed based on user requirements.


#3. Dell Alienware ($15,000)




Dell Alienware is one of the most expensive computers in the world worth over $15,000 which can extend it’s price over $5000.

Free Online OCR Site - File Conversion Made Easy Online

Optical Character Recognition (OCR) is the process of converting scanned images of documents into text. In the past OCR programs had to be installed on your computer.

The site www.onlineocr.net allows you to upload scanned documents (including multi-page PDF files), photographs from digital cameras and scanned images (JPG, JPEG, BMP, TIFF, GIF) to be converted into text.  This site supports 32 different languages.

The converted documents can be exported in Word, Text, Excel, PDF, and HTML formats.

Windows 7: The Power of FSUTIL Command

FSUTIL is a powerful command-line utility that can provide very technical information about your computer's drives, or if utilized incorrectly can cause damage to the file system.

Note: To use this utility, it requires administrative permission on the local system.

Below are a few examples of different operations that the command can perform.

Queries volume information
E.g.: fsutil fsinfo volumeinfo c:

Queries NTFS specific volume information
E.g.: fsutil fsinfo ntfsinfo c:

Creates a new file of a specified size
E.g.: fsutil file createnew C:\testfile.txt 1000

Warning: use this command at your own risk...

Below is a list of supported commands:

• Type: fsutil 8dot3name: 8dot3name management
• Type: fsutil behavior: Control file system behavior
• Type: fsutil dirty: Manage volume dirty bit
• Type: fsutil file: File specific commands
• Type: fsutil fsinfo: File system information
• Type: fsutil hardlink: Hardlink management
• Type: fsutil objectid: Object ID management
• Type: fsutil quota: Quota management
• Type: fsutil repair: Self healing management
• Type: fsutil reparsepoint: Reparse point management
• Type: fsutil resource: Transactional Resource Manager management
• Type: fsutil sparse: Sparse file control
• Type: fsutil transaction: Transaction management
• Type: fsutil usn: USN management
• Type: fsutil volume: Volume management

Hidden Feature: Chrome ABOUT Pages

If you want to enable experimental features in Google's Chrome browser, get diagnostic data, or see hidden information and features. Then you want to check out the Chrome's ABOUT pages, to access them in the address bar type "about:about" to see a list of available pages.

• about:about: Lists available Chrome About pages.
• about:appcache-internals:  Displays information about the  HTML 5 AppCache manifests.
• about:blank: Displays a blank page.
• about:cache: Displays a list of cached URLs.
• about:crash: Displays a crash page in the active tab.
• about:view-http-cache: Displays a blank page.
• about:credits: Displays credit information about different browser features.
• about:conflicts: Lists all modules loaded into the main process.
• about:dns: Displays browser DNS preresolution information.
• about:flags: Allows the enabling and disabling of experimental features.
• about:flash: Lists information about Flash.
• about:gpu: Displays informaton about the GPU charactoristics.
• about:histograms: Lists histogram about different browser features.
• about:inducebrowsercrashforrealz - Crashes the Google Chrome browser.
• about:kill: Displays a generic error message when a webpage crashes unexpectedly
• about:memory: Displays processor and memory data.
• about:net-internals:  Lists internal network and cache information.
• about:plugins: Displays informaton about the installed plug-ins.
• about:stats: Displays a blank page.
• about:sync-internals: Displays the browser sync information.
• about:tcmalloc: Lists memory and processor information for the browser.
• about:terms: Displays information about Google Chrome Terms of Service.
• about:version: Lists version information for the Chrome browser.

Windows 7: Scheduling Your Computer to Shut Down Automatically

Do you leave your computer on for extended periods of time, and would like it if your computer would automatically shut down at a specific time of day.  Follow the instructions below.

• Click the Start button, in the search box, type "scheduled tasks" then click the item in the search results.
• In the Task Scheduler console, in the Actions pane on the right, click "Create Basic Task ...".
• In the Basic Task Wizard dialog, enter a name for task, such as "Shutdown Computer" and include a optional description such as "Shuts down computer at 12:00 a.m. everyday", press the Next button.
• On the Task Trigger page, select "Daily" and press the Next button.
• On the Daily page, enter a start date and time that you want the task to first begin (e.g. 12/1/11 and 12:00 a.m.) and press the Next button.
• On the Action page, select the "Start a Program" and press the Next button.
• On the Start a Program page, in the Program/script field, type:  %SYSTEMROOT%\SYSTEM32\SHUTDOWN.EXE
• Press the Next button, review the Summary page and press the Finish button.

Based on the task that was defined above Windows will now automatically shut down at 12:00 a.m. each day. Although before it does the system will display a pop-up notification, "Windows will shut down in less than a minute."

DY undRst& dis msg? IT Tips

Windows 7: Strinking a Partition

It use to be if you had a formatted hard drive with existing partitions, and you wanted to add or shrink one of them you needed a special utility called a disk partitioning tools such as Partition Magic.  The Windows 7 Disk Management console has disk partitioning functionality built into it.

Warning: Make a good backup of your drive before proceeding with the instructions below.

• To open the Disk Management console from the Start menu, in the Search field type DISKMGMT.MSC, and press Enter. Press the YES button if prompted by the UAC (User Account Control).
• Right-click a drive that you want to shrink and choose Shrink Volume... from the menu.
• A dialog will display showing you how much space is available you can shrink the drive by. Specify an amount, then press the Shrink button.  
• Right-click the newly available partition and choose New Simple Volume. Follow the steps in the wizard to specify the size and assign a letter to the new drive, and format the new drive.

iPhone 4S FAQs and Things We Should Know

Although the iPhone 4S doesn’t seem as much like a “new phone,” because the design hasn’t changed, there are still several things that you may want to take into consideration if you are planning on purchasing the 4S. In today’s post, we will cover some frequently asked questions regarding the 4S, and also list some things you should know, prior to purchasing the device.

FAQs

When will the iPhone 4S be available in stores?
The iPhone 4S will be available for sale on October 14, 2011 in Apple Retail Stores, Apple Online Store, and Cellular stores. Currently, the 4S is available for preorder on Apple.com.
What countries is the iPhone 4S available in?
The 4S will be available on the above date in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, France, Germany, and Japan. If you live in another country that is not listed, the iPhone still may be available in your area soon. Apple is expected to make the iPhone 4S available in over 70 countries by the end of 2011.
What is the iPhone 4S price and how many models are available.
The iPhone 4S will be available in either a black color or a white color. From there, there are three capacities to choose from, each priced accordingly.

There will also be an unlocked version of the iPhone 4S, that will retail for:

16GB – $649.00
32GB – $749.00
64GB – $849.00

The unlocked version of the 4S will be sold on Apple.com.
Do I have to start a new, or add on to an existing, 2-year contract with the iPhone 4S?
More than likely, yes. However, you can purchase a unlocked iPhone 4S (mentioned above). That would keep you out of a contract, because you would be paying full retail price. There is though, something that you should know about the unlocked iPhone 4S.
An unlocked version of the 4S will not be compatible with Verizon and Sprint in the United States, so to many people in the U.S., the unlocked version won’t even be an option. It will, though, work on T-Mobile, without the need to jailbreak.
The unlocked 4S is mainly intended for use in other countries, where you can simply use a foreign carrier SIM card with the iPhone.
If you don’t want to enter a contract, you can probably purchase the iPhone 4S at full retail price from your wireless provider, or try and find a new or used 4S online from a retailer.
How do I check to see if I am eligible for an upgrade so that I can get that iPhone 4S at upgrade price?
Each carrier is a bit different, so you can always contact your wireless carrier and ask them. If you want to check online, however, you can go this page at Apple and it should inform you to whether or not you can purchase the iPhone for the upgrade price.
If I travel abroad, will the iPhone 4S work in other countries.
Yes, the iPhone 4S is a world phone that supports both major cell phone technologies: CDMA and GSM. Thus, the 4S will work in most countries.
Are there any changes to the exterior of the 4S, from the regular iPhone 4?
Yes there are, but they are very minimal. The buttons on the side are very, very slightly redesigned. Also, the case markings on the back of the iPhone may be slightly different. The most drastic change to the exterior is that the new 4S has a SIM card slot on the right side of the phone, which is needed to make it a world phone.
What specific U.S. carriers will get the iPhone 4S?
Sprint, AT&T, and Verizon are all getting the iPhone 4S.
Since the iPhone 4 is CDMA and GSM, and also available from more carriers, can I transfer to another carrier with the iPhone 4S?
Possibly not, as many wireless providers will likely have a license agreement in place, which will prevent you from transferring the 4S to other carriers. The specific iPhone that you purchase from a carrier will also likely be locked, even though it is both CDMA and GSM compatible.
However, there will likely be an unlock available on the internet soon after the iPhone 4S’s release, which would allow you to unlock the phone. From there, you should be able to do with it what you want, it’s your phone.
Will iPhone 4 accessories work with the 4S?
The high majority of iPhone 4 accessories will work with the iPhone 4S, so don’t sell or disregard any existing iPhone 4 accessories that you own, yet. The exception to this rule is that some standard iPhone 4 cases that were manufactured for early versions of the original iPhone 4 (AT&T), may not be compatible with the new 4S.
The answers provided in this article are intended to add clarity to many frequently asked questions regarding the iPhone 4S. It is also recommended that you check out our post about choosing an iPhone, as the iPhone 4 and iphone 3G will still be supported. Over at Switching To Mac, they posted an upgrade guide that can help existing iPhone owners decide whether to upgrade to the 4S.

Loop & Time My Slide Show

Did you know that you can set the timing on a PowerPoint slide show so it advances automatically?  You can also set it up so it loops continuously.  This can be handy if you create an informational slide show and you just want it to run continuously in a public place.  Here's how to do it:

Start by creating your slide show. The following instructions are for the 2003 version of PowerPoint.

Loop Continuously:

Once you have finished your show go to "Slide Show" on the menu bar and select "Set Up Show" from the menu.  In the "Set Up Show" window that appears you want to look for "Loop continuously until ESC" and check this box:

 

Slide Transitions:

Once again, go to "Slide Show" on the menu bar but this time look for "Slide Transition".  This will open the slide transition option in what's call the the "Task Pane" on the right hand side of the screen. 

At the bottom of the task pane look for the Advance Slide options.  Check the box for "Automatically after" and set the amount of seconds.  If you want every slide to advance automatically click the "Apply to all slides" button.

 

PRACTICE ACTIVITY:  Try setting the timing on a slide show sometime today.  Also, try to set it up so it loops continuously.

Fancy Email Stationery

Have you ever wondered how other people managed to change the background of their emails?  Today's tip will show you how to do it in Microsoft Outlook:

1) Go to "Tools" on the menu bar and select "Options" from the bottom of the list.

2) Select the tab for "Mail Format" and then select "Stationery Picker..." from the middle of that window:

3) Choose the stationary that you like and then click “OK"

4)  The stationary you selected should now appear next to “Use this stationary by default”   Click “OK” to set it.

These steps will only work if you're using Microsoft Outlook for your email and the steps might be slightly different in newer or older versions of the software. 

PRACTICE ACTIVITY:  If you use Outlook try changing your stationery sometime today.

Windows 7: Checking USB Device Power Usage

Did you know that there's preset limit on the available amount of power on a USB bus? If you have several USB devices plugged into your computer's USB ports, you need to be aware there is only a small amount power available for them.  Most computers have multiple what are known 'USB root hubs', and each hub can  deliver a maximum of 500 milliamps of power to attached devices. If the energy demands of the connected USB devices exceeds that limit, the USB bus can shutdown.

To check power draw of the USB devices connected to your computer:

• In the Start menu search field, type: Device Manager and press the Enter key
• In the Device Manager window, expand the node Universal Serial Bus controllers
• Double-click on one of the USB Root Hub entries.

Click the Power tab. 

This tab displays a listing of attached USB devices, how much power they use and how much is available.  If you have more USB devices then you have available ports or power.  Consider buying a power USB hub that uses energy from the wall socket and not your computer's motherboard.

5 Funny ATM Machines in the World

Funny Design and Kiddy ATM

One of the best ATM Machine Design, I have ever come across. I liked it a lot and though of sharing it with it. Its such a tricky idea with ATM Machine encrypted inside a peace of Cake designed with whole lots of exciting stuff.

Treasure ATM

Great ATM Design with creativity. Another crazy design, which is available at a Amusement park.

Low Fix ATM

Most Funniest ATM machines I have ever seen, Instead of drawing money from the ATM by standing we need to sit on the floor and happily draw Money, Crazy isn’t it?

Elephant Design ATM

One of Strangest Designed ATM with whole lots of creativity.

Draw Hard ATM

How hard you work to earn money, you need to work that harder to draw money. Lolz one of the toughest and funniest ATM design to draw the cash.

Mobile ATM

Where ever you Go, our ATM follows. The Mobile ATM now follows you.

How to hide files in JPEG pictures - Tip

If you’re looking to hide files on your PC hard drive, you may have read about ways to encrypt folders or change the attributes on a file so that they cannot be accessed by prying eyes. However, a lot of times hiding files or folders in that way requires that you install some sort of software on your computer, which could then be spotted by someone else.
I’ve actually written quite a few articles on how you can hide files and folders in Windows XP and Vista before, but here I’m going to show you a new way to hide files that is very counter-intuitive and therefore pretty safe! Using a simple trick in Windows, you can actually hide a file inside of the JPG picture file!
You can actually hide any type of file inside of an image file, including txt, exe, mp3, avi, or whatever else. Not only that, you can actually store many files inside of single JPG file, not just one! This can come in very handy if you need to hide files and don’t want to bother with encryption and all that other technical stuff.

Hide File in Picture

In order to accomplish this task, you will need to have either WinZip or WinRAR installed on your computer. You can download either of these two off the Internet and use them without having to pay anything. Here are the steps for creating your hidden stash:

• Create a folder on your hard drive, i.e. C:\Test and put in all of the files that you want to hide into that folder. Also, place the image that you will be using to hide the files in.

Now select all of the files that you want to hide, right-click on them, and choose the option to add them to a compressed ZIP or RAR file. Only select the files you want to hide, not the picture. Name it whatever you want, i,e. “Hidden.rar”.



Now you should have a folder that looks something like this with files, a JPG image, and a compressed archive:

Now here’s the fun part! Click on Start, and then click on Run. Type in “CMD” without the quotes and press Enter. You should now see the command prompt window open. Type in “CD \” to get to the root directory. Then type CD and the directory name that you created, i.e. “CD Test“.

Now type in the following line: “copy /b DSC06578.JPG + Hidden.rar DSC06578.jpg” and press Enter. Do not use the quotes. You should get a response like below:

Just make sure that you check the file extension on the compressed file, whether it is .ZIP or .RAR as you have to type out the entire file name with extension in the command. I have heard that some people say that they have had problems doing this with a .ZIP extension, so if that doesn’t work, make sure to compress to a .RAR file.
And that’s it! The picture file will have been updated with the compressed archive inside! You can actually check the file size of the picture and see that it has increased by the same amount as the size of the archive.
You can access your hidden file in two ways. Firstly, simply change the extension to .RAR and open the file using WinRAR. Secondly, you can just right-click on the JPG image and choose Open With and then scroll down to WinRAR. Either way, you’ll see your hidden files show up that you can then extract out.

That’s it! That is all it takes to hide files inside JPG picture files! It’s a great way simply because not many people know it’s possible and no one even thinks about a picture as having to the ability to “hide” files. Enjoy!

How to create a secured and locked folder in Windows XP

Here are the steps to create the protected folder in Windows XP:

• First create a folder that you will use to store your confidential data. For example, I have created a folder called Fonts at the root of my D drive. Since the hidden folder will bring you to the Control Panel, it’s best to name the folder as one of the programs inside there.

• In the same location where you created the new folder, create a new file in Notepad, copy the following below into it, replace Fonts with the name of your folder and save it as loc.bat.

ren Fonts Fonts.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D}

• To save the file as a .bat file in Notepad, just put the whole thing in quotes, like “loc.bat” and then click Save.

Now you should have a bat file named loc in the same directory as your Fonts folder, not inside the Fonts folder.

• Create another NotePad file and type in the following listed below and save it as “key.bat”.

ren Fonts.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} Fonts

• Now you’ll have loc.bat and key.bat along with your folder. Go ahead and double-click on loc.bat and your folder will turn into the Control Panel and nothing inside can be viewed. Clicking on it will simply bring you to the Control Panel. You’ll notice the icon should have changed also.

• To view the data inside your folder again, click on key.bat and your folder will return to normal! Pretty simple!

Of course, keeping the key.bat file in the same folder will defeat the purpose of securing the folder, so it’s best to move the key.bat file somewhere else, or even better, put it on a USB stick or CD that only you can access.
Most people will be probably look at the folder and simply ignore it since it has the control panel icon and it links directly there. Of course, if someone knows this trick also, they can create their own key.bat file, etc and open it back up. However, if you’re dealing with someone who can do all of that, it’s best you check out more advanced 3rd party software to lock down a folder.
ALTERNATIVE METHOD:
If you’re having trouble with the above-mentioned method (from what I can see from the comments, a good number of people), then here’s another quick and free way to create a secure folder in Windows XP. There is a very nice program called Free Hide Folder from Cleanersoft that allows you to easily hide your private folders.
Your folders are completely hidden and you must supply a password to open the program to unhide the folders. The personal edition is free, just click the Skip Registration button unless you’re using it for commercial purposes.

Excel in the Classroom - Tip

For today' technology tip we have some online resources for adding Excel to a classroom curriculum.  For example, here's a great site all about using Excel in the classroom:  http://www.internet4classrooms.com/on-line_excel.htm

The site offers some short tutorials that explain the basic features of Excel.  The tutorials are from the point of view of an Apple Macintosh user so there are some things that would be different on one of our IBM or PC format computers (such as a Dell, Gateway or HP computer).  The links to "Excel Worksheet Basics" are all at the top of the web page.

Further down the page there is a whole list of online excel worksheets that you can access and even download to your computer.   Here are some examples of the pre-made workbooks that are available:

Fostering Literacy Using Excel:  http://www.internet4classrooms.com/literacy_with_excel.xls

A Jeopardy Template:  http://www.internet4classrooms.com/jeopardy_science_tetc.xls

Group Project about how students spend their time:  http://www.internet4classrooms.com/work/how_i_spend.xls 

For even more online Excel Activities check out this website from the North Canton City Schools in Ohio:  http://www.northcanton.sparcc.org/~technology/excel/

Or go to YouTube and Learn how to make your own Games in Excel:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1Cxia_09SU

Convert Text from Images into Editable Text Files the Easy Way

Most scanners come with software that converts scanned images containing text into editable text files. However, many of us have started using our cell phone cameras to take pictures of documents—most of our phones, however, do not have OCR (Optical Character Recogition) built in.
One quick way to turn any image, even those taken with our cameras, into an editable text file is to use an online service like Free Online OCR.


To start, click the Choose File button on the left side of the page and choose the image you wish to convert to a text file. Supported file types include PDF, GIF, BMP, JPEG, TIFF or PNG.



From the drop-down menu to the right of the choose file button, select the type of text file to which you want the image’s text converted. The choices include DOC, PDF, RTF or TXT.



Click the orange Convert button to start translating your image to text.


A progress bar will appear, showing your images transition from image to document.



When your file is done, an orange Download button appears below this progress bar. Click it to download your text file.


In our tests, the more white the background of the image, the better the service recognized the text. So, if at all possible, lighten badly lit photographs before attempting to convert them to text files. Overall, the service works well—especially for converting PDFs to DOC files.

Insert Different Types of Hyperlinks into an Excel Spreadsheet - Tips

Like all of the applications that are part of the Microsoft Office suite, you can place different types of hyperlinks into your Excel spreadsheet to create an interactive experience for yourself or anyone else who views your document. You can add the following three main types of hyperlinks into an Excel spreadsheet:

1. an existing file or webpage
2. a place in the same document
3. another document
4. an e-mail address

Each of these hyperlinks functions just like any other links found in Office applications. Using these links, you can guide another user to more information and create an interactive experience for the viewer.

Adding Hyperlinks to an Excel Spreadsheet

A hyperlink in an Excel spreadsheet must reside within a cell in a worksheet. Like all links, you can customize both the text and the location to where the link points. Outlined below is a demonstration of adding each of the four types of hyperlinks to Excel.

Add a Link to an Existing File or Webpage

The most common type of hyperlink is one that links to a file, webpage, or website. These files can be located either locally, on a private network, or on the web.

Remember, though, that if you want anyone to be able to use these links, that person needs to have access to the location where the file or webpage resides. Normally, this simply means that the user must have an active Internet connection.

As an example, let’s add a link in Excel to a website’s homepage. Begin by opening up a new Excel workbook and clicking on the cell where you want the hyperlink to reside. Click on the Insert tab on the Ribbon and then locate and click on the Hyperlink button.

You should now be looking at the Insert Hyperlink dialogue window. On the left hand side of the window, click on the button titled Existing File or Web Page. At the top of the window, type in the text to display for the link. At the bottom of the window, type in the location of the website.

Click the OK button and you’ll notice that Excel placed the link right where you wanted it.

Although a link to a webpage or website is the most common type of hyperlink, you can also add three other types of links into an Excel spreadsheet.

Add a Link to a Place in the Same Document

Adding a link to a place in the same Excel document is useful when you have a lot of data and you want users of the document to be able to zoom around the spreadsheet with ease.

Begin by clicking on the cell where you want the link to reside. Using the same steps as above, open up the Insert Hyperlink dialogue window. This time, however, click on the button titled Place in This Document.

At the top of the window, type in the text to display for the link. You may wish to use the default text as it displays the worksheet and destination of the link automatically. In the box labeled Type the Cell Reference, type in the cell location to where you want the link to point. For our example, we have chosen the cell located at z88.

Click on the OK button and notice that Excel places a link to the cell location in the cell you’ve chosen. Click on the link and can immediately jump to the linked cell.

Add a Link to a New Document

You are not limited to linking to just cells with the same document. You can even create a link to an external Excel spreadsheet. Once again, click on the cell where you want the link and open up the Insert Hyperlink dialogue window.

This time, click on the button titled Create New Document. At the top of the window, type in the text to display for the link and in the box labeled Name of New Document, type  in a name for the new file.

Notice that you can click the Change button to change where the you want to store the document. In the section labeled When to Edit, choose whether you want to Edit the New Document Later or Edit the New Document Now (default).

Click the OK button and Excel will place your link to the external file where you indicated. Depending on whether you chose to edit the new file now or later, Excel may open up the new document for you to edit/create.

Add a Link to an E-mail Address

Finally, you can add a link to an e-mail so that when the user clicks on it, his/her e-mail client will automatically open with the target e-mail address already filled in for the To field.

One more time select the cell where you want the link to reside and open up the Insert Hyperlink dialogue window. Click the button titled E-mail Address and notice that you have three options only two of which must be filled in. You must fill in some text to display for the link in the box labeled Test to Display and you must provide an e-mail address in the box labeled E-mail Address.

You also have the option of filling in the subject field for the user but this is entirely optional. Click on the OK button and Excel will place your link where you indicated.

Adding different types of links into an Excel spreadsheet can help you point users to information on the web, jump to a location within the same document, link to an external file, or link to an e-mail address with the subject field already filled in. Using these hyperlinks, you can make your Excel spreadsheets more interactive and easier to navigate.

Internet Explorer: Automatically Clearing the Cache - Tip

Internet Explorer (IE) automatically keeps a local copy of all the web pages, images, and other objects that you view in your browser. The reason for doing this is to speed up the browsing experience by keeping local copies of the content that has not changed when you revisit a web page.

There are two reasons some people don't like these file stored on their hard drive. First and foremost for privacy reasons, and second because it can consume a lot of space.

You can manually clear the cache from the Tools menu, by selecting Internet Options. Then on the General tab, pressing the Delete Files button. You can also configure IE to automatically clear the browser cache when you exit the program.

• From the Internet Options dialog, select the Advanced tab.
• In the Setting listbox, under the Security section, check 'Empty Temporary Internet Files folder when browser is closed'.
• Press the OK button.