Q–I use Microsoft Internet Explorer for Internet access and I don’t like the way it keeps a record of every Web site I visit so that other computer users can see where I’ve been afterward. I want to know how to delete addresses that show up on this pull-down list. Can you help?
Ted Ligibel, Chicago
A–I, too, hate the fact that anybody who comes along can find out where I have been on the Internet by simply calling up the history tab on the Microsoft browser. This Big Brother feature, which has some very useful business applications for those who need to return quickly to numerous sites, takes a bit of doing to disable–but not much.
Right-click on the Start button and call up the Windows 98 Explorer program. Scroll down the list of folders that comes up until you find the one marked Windows. Then look under Windows for a subfolder History.
When you open that subfolder there will be subfolders for every week you have run the browser. You can either delete the whole lot or delete on a week-by-week basis. A folder marked Today includes your most recent history.
Q–My new PC with Windows 98 locks up when the screen saver is on for any length of time. The screen freezes and the keyboard doesn’t respond. Even control/alt/delete doesn’t work. I have to manually shut it off and turn it back on, at which time I get a message not to do that. What should I do?
Cliff Kellogg @pe.net
A–I had to smile when I got your note. A friend of mine who covers the medical science beat loves to tell the story about the guy who goes to the doctor and raises his arm over his head and says, “Doc, it hurts when I do this!”
“Then don’t do that,” advises the doctor.
You’ve got a bum screen saver and you need to disable it. Move your cursor out onto the desktop and click the right mouse and then select Properties from the box that pops up.
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The next box that appears has a tab at the top marked Screen Saver. Click that Tab and you’ll find a box for each of the screen savers in your machine.
Either swap the one you’re using now with a new one or just select None to make sure this has fixed your problem.
Q–I have a Compaq PC and recently had to reinstall the operating system. Naturally, I lost the Lotus 1-2-3 program and I can no longer find the original installation disk. I did, however, back up my Lotus files on a floppy.
I was told at a computer store that Lotus in its original version is no longer manufactured, and that Excel is what most people are using these days. I purchased the Excel package and the install went well. However, I have yet to figure out how to copy my Lotus files from the floppy on the A drive Into Excel on the C drive.
What am I doing wrong?
Tree Genchi @aol.com
A–One thing you’re wrong about is that you need Microsoft Excel these days to read old Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheets, a common bit of misinformation that sadly keeps people in the dark about the fact that IBM bought out Lotus a few years ago. Lotus 1-2-3 is bigger and better than ever as part of the superb Lotus SmartSuite software, which competes with Microsoft Office (including Excel).
In either SmartSuite or Excel, you simply need to click on the File option at the top of the screen and choose Open. In the next box you need to make two choices. First click on the source area to select the A floppy drive. Then look for the File Type selection and click through it until you find Lotus 1-2-3 for DOS and you’ll be able to load your files and resave them on the PC’s hard drive.
Q–I just bought a scanner and tried to scan pictures and documents. The scanning part worked fine, but when I tried to save them, it gives me only two choices for file type: either .bmp, or .tif. The problem is that when I try to attach these files with my e-mail for sending it to friends, it takes too long (almost 30 to 45 minutes), and sometimes I even get disconnected during file transfer.
I’m told that I need to convert these pictures into a format called .jpg to make them small enough for e-mail but I don’t know how to do this.
Sharma Subhash @infores.com
A–I know you probably got a good price on your scanner, but that may be because the manufacturer cut corners by providing extremely cheap software that does no more than scan pictures into the easiest formats for programmers to write into their applications. As you note, however, both formats require huge amounts of disk space and take an impossibly long time to transfer via e-mail.
If you’re running Windows 98, you can load .bmp files into the Paint program and then use the Save As choice to save them as far smaller .jpg files.
A far better choice would to buy a third-party scanning program like Xerox Corp.’s splendid $50 Pagis Scanworks, which will do much more than just let you scan images into e-mail friendly .jpg format.
The software also lets you edit pictures, crop them, change colors and add special effects. It also offers one of the easiest to use scanned file managers to be had anywhere.
Q–Do you have any idea why this would be happening? Every time I sign on to America Online I lose the connection after about three minutes. Then I immediately sign on again and the connection will be fine for as long as I stay on.
When the connection is lost AOL reports a carrier lost message received from the modem. I use AOL 4.0 and an external US Robotics 56K v.90 modem on my 200 Mhz Acer Aspire. The Aspire comes with a 33.6 bps internal modem and it never would lose the AOL connection. I still have that modem connected on COM2 and the 56K is on COM1.
Could there be a bug in the newer modem’s (Internet software) or some incompatibility between AOL and the modem?
Tom Paige @juno.com
A–You’ve run afoul of a feature in the AOL 4.0 software that lets a user specify a different modem as well as a different phone number for fallback dialing if a first attempt fails. Chances are the modem setting is wrong on the first setting and correct on the fallback. In other words, the AOL software is treating your new modem as though it had the settings of your old one.
So you need to click on the Setup button on the America Online sign-on screen and then chose Expert Add. That will take you to a box where you can set both the modem and the phone number for first try and for fallback. Once you have adjusted both for the USR modem you’ll be back in business quicker than you can say, “You’ve got mail.”
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Contact Jim Coates via e-mail at [email protected] or snail mail at the baiduhai, Room 400, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago 60611. If you think you’ve got a better answer to any of these questions, add your point of view at www.chicagotribune.com/go/askjim.