Did you know you only need to type a few letters to go to a website?

Your computer remembers the sites/pages you have been in. For example, if you have been in rpbooks.weebly.com you only need to type rpb and the whole website URL will pop up. You have to pay attention to what you are typing, but it saves a lot of time to only type rpb instead of rpbooks.weebly.com. This works only on sites you have been on.

'Bookmarking' a website for easy access

Did you know that it is possible to 'bookmark' a website so that you can return to it easily? If you find yourself using a website multiple times and are tired of typing it in the box at the top, consider bookmarking it. I will use Google Chrome as my browser and the Nashville Public Library as my example. In the address bar, where the URL (name of website) is, type library.nashville.org . The Nashville Public Library website should come up. At the very right of the address bar is a star. Put your cursor on the star, you will see a little popup that says 'bookmark this page'. Click on the star. A larger box will pop up and allow you to change the name of the bookmark and put the bookmark into a specific folder. Choose Bookmarks Bar if you want it to always be on top of any page. The new bookmark is put at the end of your list of bookmarks, so if you have a lot of bookmarks you will need to go into 'manage my bookmarks' to move it to the top of the list. At the very top of your page, there are 3 vertical dots. That is the settings icon for Chrome. Click on that and choose Bookmark Manager. This is where you can manage your bookmarks by assigning categories/folders of bookmarks. If you want to have your latest bookmark show up in the bookmarks bar at the top of your screen, you need to be sure the Show Bookmarks Bar is checked. Then you can drag the latest bookmark up to the top or rearrange them in the order that suits you.

What is the difference between a 'smart tv' and a 'regular tv'

COAX cable

A traditional TV is able to obtain programming only from your local cable company which in our area is Comcast/Xfinity. Your TV is cabled into the wall with a round cable called a COAX cable. You are essentially 'streaming' Comcast/Xfinity programming through the COAX cable to your TV. You can have basic programming or subscribe to many additional channels for a fee. 

A smart TV is able to obtain/stream programming from companies other than Comcast/Xfinity and it does not come through your COAX cable. Netflix, HULU, Apple TV, Roku, Amazon Fire and Chromecast are just a few of the options. Some of these companies require you to plug a USB device (looks like a thumb/flash drive) 

Amazon Fire USB and Remote

into the back or side of the TV.  Some require a small box, similar to your Comcast cable box, that will plug into the back of your TV. Each company offers different programming options. The Dowells currently use Netflix, HULU, Amazon Fire and Chromecast.  For more info please check out:

https://www.lifewire.com/what-is-internet-streaming-2483601 


RaggZ Katt Dowell reporting from 'Over the Rainbow Bridge'

What is a Smart Phone? By RaggZ Katt Dowell

What exactly is a "smartphone".  What makes it smart?

A smartphone is a cell phone that does a lot more than make and receive calls and texts. Smartphones are essentially very small computers as they have internet access and can do anything a pc can do. You can access the internet, watch videos like YouTube, send and read email, download books and read them and access social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. You can have any question answered in a few seconds by typing a question into the search box or using your voice to ask the question. For example, if you are eating lunch with people and someone asks what time the Vanderbilt game starts, you could have your cell phone look it up and have the answer immediately. They also can make phone calls. It is hard to believe that a cell phone is as powerful as a pc and you can hold it in your hand and slip it into your pocket.

RaggZ Katt Dowell

CTRL + F by Janis Spivey

“Come on, little pawty dog! Hewp me find the little putty tat!”  Bugs Bunny

Dixie, being the practical dog she is, decided her first blog should be something very useful – CTRL + F.

Microsoft decided, in a rare moment of compassion for their users, to implement Keyboard Shortcuts. Wonderful! The most useful is the CTRL + F (hold down the CTRL key and then enter F).  

A small box will appear on your screen, normally in the top, right-hand corner. Enter the search term you want, usually a word, and hit Enter. If you are at the top of the document, the first occurrence will be found. The Find command box also shows how many occurrences of that term are present, e.g. ‘1 of 8.’ It also highlights the term.  If you’re in the middle of the document, it will say ‘5 of 8,’ and, if you continue searching, it will return the next occurrence, and will loop to the top of the document if you click the Next (points down) or Previous (points up) arrow.

Within Microsoft Word, the Find ‘binocular icon’ actually activates the CTRL + F function for its search. The Find box appears in the top left corner outside the document.  The Find box is at the top right in some browsers.

The term can be multiple words. If you want to find all the Tom Hanks movies we have, simply enter Tom Hanks in the find box (we have 19). FYI, caps don’t matter; you could enter tom hanks.  

Using CTRL + F is especially useful for our RPBOOKS website. Within the Residents Directory you can search for a person’s name or find all residents who have the name Bob (CTRL + F, search word Bob). Within books you can search for all books having a particular word in their title – especially helpful if you can’t remember the book title. Or you can search for a specific author. Within movies you can search for an actor, a movie in the category ‘comedy’ or for release year ‘2015’ for a recent movie.  

Of potentially even more value, CTRL + F works on most screens. It works on a PDF.  It works on your bank’s online system, and, if you’ve downloaded your statement, it’s good at finding transactions with computer generated info, e.g. finding your ‘COMCAST’ payments. It, of course, doesn’t work on pictures or handwritten words.  

Give CTRL + F a try. Dixie thinks you’ll like it too!

What is "The Cloud"? by RaggZ Katt Dowell

Everyone knows what clouds are, they are the puffy white things in the sky. I used to think Angels lived up there. In tech terms, it is not a place where Angels live. Nor are they puffy white things in the sky. Of course, who is to say Angels don't live in the puffy white things in the sky? But I digress, enough of that deep thinking. I am getting a headache.

"The Cloud" refers to lots of computers with lots of wires and silicon chips that exist here on earth. A company that has lots of money can buy lots of computers and buy land and build a huge building to house them. Another name for "The Cloud" is server farm. Then the company can charge companies or individuals to store their data. In the olden days ordinary people like us would buy a computer with a hard drive inside the computer and all our stuff would be stored in our own computer in our own house and we would have to be at home to access our stuff. Hard drives are like filing cabinets. People store folders and files in different size filing cabinets. We start off with a 2 drawer one and expand to a 4 drawer one and then add another 4 drawer one and pretty soon we have to rent a storage room at a local storage facility and pay a monthly fee to the company who owns the storage facility. The storage facility could be thought of as "The Cloud". Our personal stuff is no longer stored at our house but at another facility that we can access when we want. That way filing cabinets are not taking over extra bedrooms, the oven, the bathtub we don't use, etc. We can also think of our storage room here at Richland Place as "The Cloud". We store stuff there that we don't want to clutter up our apartment but have access to it whenever we want.

There are many benefits to "Cloud" storage. My Hooman has all her favorite recipes and her old Thanksgiving lists in the "Cloud" that she share with family members. She used to take paper copies of those with her when she traveled at Thanksgiving. She could be anywhere and she would have access to those lists without her paper copies. Sometimes people wanted a particular recipe and she would give them the website that had them and they could print them whenever they wanted.

Photo sharing is another benefit of cloud storage. Photo files have become larger because digital cameras and cell phones are getting better. Sharing photos with many people used to be accomplished by attaching them to an email which might not be able to process that many files. Now you can upload them to "The Cloud" and share the access to them with lots of people. You are not trying to send 10 photos to 10 people, you are only sending one link to 10 people to click on to access the photos. There are lots of photos of mine in "The Cloud". There are lots of companies that offer free photo storage in their cloud. Remember, that type of cloud exists on earth someplace. Some clouds that I use are Google, Amazon, and Microsoft. Google is building a cloud on the ground in Clarksville. They just purchased the former Hemlock Semiconductor site.

So--if you hear someone talking about "The Cloud", don't think of angels in the sky, look toward Clarksville and think huge computer hard drives that store stuff.

Please feel free to comment or ask questions of Dixie Dogg or me, RaggZ Katt. We will be happy to try to help you.