OVER 2 YOU, 051 (11/10/01)

ANAGRAMS

I am trying to find a program, which will enable anagrams to be made of short phrases and words, the more letters that can be processed the better.

Can anyone help?
I.M.Tasker, Budleigh Salterton, Devon

IM Tasker, Budleigh Salterton, Devon (which can become "Dreamlike, loving thousands better" or "Brothels give tremendous data-link!") might find that "Anagram Genius" from www.genius2000.com will do what he requires.

Adrian Cleaton,

The best program is  "Puzzlex" from: www.puzzlex.cwc.net/

Paul Wright,

Try www.anagramgenius.com.

Michael Bateman, via email

Go to: www.wordsmith.org

Malcolm MacLellan,

Anagram Master answered my prayers. Although it is a Windows 3x program, it works, and then some! It is Public Domain software, and can be found at: http://www.winsite.com/bin/Info?2465. It's handy for solving Countdown's conundrums too!
T. J. Keith,

Download a free version of Crossword Maestro from:
http://www.crosswordmaestro.com/agd84.exe
Roger King,

Try the excellent WordWeb (about £15 from www.wordweb.co.uk).  I've used it for several years, and would thoroughly recommend it.  It is a UK dictionary with powerful word-search features (wildcards etc) and can also be used to find and generate straight, partial and multi-word anagrams.  I don't know what the maximum length it can deal with is, but I've tried it with a 46-character phrase, and that worked fine.  On my Pentium 2 it's extremely fast.
Paul Doherty, Egham, Surrey.

You could try www.x-word.com, the downloadable demo has a function for anagrams.

Lionel Miles,

BROCHURE SOFTWARE

I have started a business selling crystal table and giftware.  I am looking to produce a brochure of all my designs. I need to find a software package for Windows that will transform my ideas into print and eventually web pages.  The designs would be reduced and then scanned.  I would want to add text, colour and other graphics.  What software packages are available that are sophisticated but not too hard to learn? 

William Buckley, via email

Serif Page Plus is good and an easy to learn package for printed material, and has templates ready to use. Illuminatus is an excellent program for producing web pages or stand-alone interactive catalogues --it's not quite use-straight-from-the-box simple, but it's very intuitive and (given its power) fairly easy to learn.

However, if he's looking for a single program to handle the lot, I would suggest looking closely at Star Office, which I use all the time.  It's an integrated office system including word processor, drawing package, and web browser.  It can produce HTML pages as easily as text documents, so there's no need to learn a whole new program from scratch when he's ready to create web pages -- he can even convert his text brochure into HTML as a starting point for the web page.  It's also a good standard word processor for day-to-day business correspondence, and it has a good spreadsheet (though the database facility isn't up to much).  Particularly recommended for those who don't want to use Microsoft products, and it's a good deal cheaper than MS Office or Lotus SmartSuite. For the image processing, Mr Buckley won't find better (or a better bargain) than Paint Shop Pro.
Roberta Davies, Bolton 

TV VIEWERS

Can you tell me how they determine the number of viewers looking at a particular television programme, and how can they tell how many switched off when the programme changes? These figures are regularly given in the press but I cannot see how they are arrived at.

Robin Morris, via email

If I recall correctly, a sample number of households are provided with keypads (one per member of the household) and a recording device. Each member 'logs in' when watching television, including the channel being watched. Channel changes are also logged. Each individual logs in and out to show what is actually watched. Obviously, great discipline is required from these individuals to ensure that the data they supply is accurate. The figures obtained from these sample households are extrapolated to represent total viewing figures.
Tony Miller,

EXCEL CONVERTER

As the owner of a hire centre and an Excel user, I have a frequent need to convert from metric to imperial measures and vice versa. Is there a convenient Excel resource that can do this?

Ian Jennens, via email

Excel does have a function for converting imperial measures to metric and vice versa. The syntax is: =CONVERT(value,"from","to) where value is the value to be converted, "from" is the original unit i.e. "gal" and "to" is the new unit i.e. "l" (lower case L). The value can be replaced by a cell reference as can the from and to units. This can be useful if the original value is sometimes imperial and sometimes metric. For example cell B3 is the input cell, C3 the "from" unit and E3 contains the following =IF(C3="gal","l",IF(C3="l","gal","enter unit")) this will give a reminder to enter the unit into C3 and automatically adjust the output unit. In cell D3 type the following formula =CONVERT(B3,C3,E3). To convert simply enter the value in B3, the unit in C3 and the converted value will appear in D3 with it's unit in E3.

If the error #NAME? appears in cell D3 the Analyse Pak has to be added. To do this press <tools>, <add ins> and check the box against Analysis Pak. Return to cell D3 press f2 to edit and enter without changing anything and the value should appear.  Another useful formula which allows area conversion is =(CONVERT(SQRT(value),"m","ft"))^2 this will convert m² to ft² and can be edited for vice versa or modified as the previous example.

Mike Freeman,

A free Excel add-in metric converter is available from www.excelman.co.uk. The add-in also allows for optional suffixes and rounds (rather than formats) the results of conversion to avoid arithmetic rounding errors.
Colin Lewis,

Forget Excel.  There is an excellent freeware product called "measure.exe" which will convert almost anything you can think of into almost anything else - weights, distance, area, volume etc. It's tiny (8kb), can sit in your task bar
and can be found at www.tucows.com and probably elsewhere.
Michael Walker,

SUPERCALC

I have some old spreadsheets constructed in SuperCalc version 2.1.is there any quick way of converting these into Excel?

Keith Haycock, via email

An interesting challenge, given the age (and lack of support from CA) of SuperCalc. The best suggestion would be to export from SuperCalc to Lotus-123 or .wk format, and then bring the Lotus version into Excel. This reportedly works okay for smaller spreadsheets, but sometimes comes up with a "Cell out of range" error. Another alternative would be to export to CSV (Comma Separated Values). With all these methods you will have to recode any macros.

Depending on urgency and/or budget there are a mob in the US who offer a migration service: http://www.triousa.com/Convert/Supercalc.htm. There is also a development utility called FileMerlin (http://www.acii.com/fmdvref.htm ) which provides some support for SuperCalc conversions

Jeremy E Cath, Sydney, Australia

MOUSELESS TEXT READER

Can anyone suggest the cheapest scanner and software that will get text from magazines and newspapers, put it into a Word document and then read it out without any proof reading? It is vital that all this be done without any use of the mouse, as our clients are blind. Obviously, it is also impossible to use the mouse even to select text. RNIB computer volunteers have been trying to crack this for months. We have ReadBack, Readplease and we have used Omnipage and Textbridge as well as various macros, but always, we get to the dreaded point where the mouse has to be used.
Brian Rhodes, via email

If you already have a PC, a scanner, and Textbridge or Omnipage, your cheapest option is to buy the LookOUT screen reader, costing either eighty pounds or ninety-five pounds - the higher price includes a variety of tutorial cassettes, and manuals on tape and in large print. LookOUT lets blind or partially-sighted people use PCs independently.  It works well with Word, and either Textbridge or Omnipage. You can scan and read back, controlling everything entirely from the keyboard, but it's worth noting that LookOUT also enables you to move the mouse pointer around if you ever need to, from the keyboard using the number pad keys.

More information from www.screenreader.co.uk, where you'll also find details of complete computer/scanner/printer systems with LookOUT, Word and Textbridge pre-installed.
Jane Copsey,

 
Check the following: http://www.hiddensoft.com/ On this site, there's a utility called Auto-it, which can automate almost any kind of task since it simulates keystrokes and mouse actions in an absolute or relative way. Once a script is designed, it can be reused by anyone. It might be helpful for other problems blind people are facing when working with computers.

Kris Nackaerts,

CAN YOU HELP?

I'm looking for some software to help me plan a long trip around England. I need two things - to be able to print out a map of England (and, if possible, maps of regions with more detail) with specific towns marked on it while ignoring other towns. Secondly, I would like to be able to do some route-planning, specifying roads and calculating an approximate distance for
these routes.
Jennifer Delaney,

I have been trying to reproduce a piece of cross-stitch worked by my mother in the 1930's.  It is now faded, and, in some parts, worn out. Two attempts to stitch the same thing have not really worked out, so I am now looking for a way to put it on screen, where I can adjust and correct it at length. Does anyone know of a suitable program?   Patterns like this are drawn on finely squared paper, each square representing one crossed stitch.   Printed patterns indicate different colours by different symbols, but I need a program where I can put in the actual colours.
Eleane Spence, via email

I have some very important files backed up with what I believe was the Windows 3.1 version of Backup. The files on the floppies have names in the format Cc90217a.001 through to Cc90217a.010 and can no longer be recognised by the version of Backup now found on Windows 95 and 98. Does anyone know where I can get a copy of the 3.1 Backup or, failing that, how I can decompress these archived files?

Barry Riley, via email

I am an amateur singer, singing in local concerts and music festivals.  From time to time I find a piece of music which I would like to perform, but would prefer it in another key. Rather than having to go to an experienced musician and ask for it to be transposed up or down I would prefer to do this myself, but I do not have the knowledge to do this. Is there software available to enable me to produce instant key changes to any given piece, and hopefully a scale of keys from highest to lowest                               

K.T Naughton, via email