OVER 2 YOU, 125 (08/04/03)

SKETCH SOFTWARE

I recently came across a photo-booth type machine that took your picture and then turned it into a surprisingly authentic-looking pencil sketch, with a hand on the screen 'drawing' the picture. Does anyone know of a PC program that can do something similar?

Lew Fraser, via email

I have used Adobe Photoshop: open the photograph and select Filter. Under Filter there are several choices, but Artistic then Coloured Pencil is a possibility or better is Sketch then Chalk & Charcoal or Conté Crayon.

Alan M. Pardoe

Ulead Photo Express has the facility to make your photographs look like sketches, oil paintings, etc.

Mrs J.Butler

JASC Paint Shop Pro 7 has quite a reasonable "black pencil" effect.

Tony Etheridge

SHARING A COMPUTER

My daughter's family shares a computer, it has two drives, and I was hoping to install the same operating system on each one, so that my grandson's mess was confined to 'his' drive and the other could be kept clean and fast. Can anyone recommend a program for dual-booting a PC, the software I've tried is unfriendly with tables of drives, partitions etc. It's fine for geeks, but all I'm looking for is something that presents a simple choice like 'Tom or Mum'?

Peter Brown, via email

I had exactly the same problem. The solution is a program called BootMagic, which is bundled with PartionMagic though you only need to install the former. It is easy and intuitive to install. You can set it up so that on boot up it gives you a choice of "Tom" or "Mum" and you can also password protect if you want.

Mike Armsworth

Windows XP  (Home version) has an excellent system by which three separate users can log on to their own files and settings. Ours is set up for myself, my husband and 'visitor'. The grandchildren can log on to 'visitor' and more or less do what they like without altering any of our settings.

Hilary Kemmett

Why not the let operating system do the work for you? Dual boot programs can be notoriously flaky, but with Windows XP Pro, Uncle Bill finally got it right.

Insert your Windows CD into your CD drive and turn the machine on. Assuming you have already installed it to Drive C: allow it to go through the first couple of screens until you come to where you want to install it. At this point, tell it to install on Drive D: and follow the rest of the normal installation procedure, allowing it to reboot normally to finalise the installation.

When everything has finished, the next time you turn on your PC, you will have a black screen with two boot options - either Drive C: or Drive D: If neither is selected within 30 seconds, it will boot to Drive C: by default.

In order to name the different boot options, boot to Drive C: and right click My Computer and then select properties. Click the 'Advanced' tab and select the 'Settings' button for Startup and Recovery. Here you will have a screen with a drop down box with something like "Drive C: Normal Boot /fastdetect" highlighted. Click the Edit button and you will get notepad with something like the following:

[boot loader]

timeout=30

default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS

[operating systems]

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Drive C: Normal Boot" /fastdetect

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Drive D: Video Editing" /fastdetect

This is the boot.ini file. Change ONLY what is inside the quotation marks to the names you want, and then click save. The next time you boot you will have the named options you want.

Dr Jon Brody

KEEPING TABS ON EXCEL

I regularly use Excel but with increasing age, I am finding it more and more difficult to read the tabs at the bottom of the sheets. Is it possible to enlarge these?

Jenny S., via email

Your correspondent might want to take a look at: http://www.magnifiers.org/ where a range of utilities can be downloaded that allows the area around the mouse to be magnified (as well as other variations). This might be of greater benefit than just addressing a particular Excel issue.

Martin Sisson, via email

EARLY TEXT MESSAGING

Whilst trying to convince my 12-year old 'know-all' granddaughter that there was nothing new under the sun I pointed out that many years ago, long before computers and mobile phones, we used a form of shorthand Text Messaging on Telex machines to 'chat' to other Telex users but I couldn't for the life of me remember any examples. Can anyone help me out, to prove to her that I'm not going senile?

Pru Stevens, via email

I have in my bookcase a copy of Everybody's Pocket Code by W. M. Saunders. It is for 'simplicity, economy, secrecy in cabling and telegraphing' and claims '400 Million Phrases, for One Complete Cipher Word each'. For example, in the section relating to Hotels, Boarding Houses, Hydropathic Establishments, etc. 'bixfu' means  'At what rate can you engage a carriage with two horses and a coachman?', clearly, no mobile telephone owner should be without one of these!

Malcolm Spicer

Another one sent by way of an apology or sometimes in despair: TICIFU (Typical ICI foul-up). Needless to say from an ex-ICI employee...

Alan Bloomfield, via email

PIANO TUNING

Having spent a considerable time renovating an 1830's Broadwood Cabinet piano, including re-stringing in the original iron and brass wires, now comes the task of tuning.  Does anyone know of any software that can be used to measure the vibrations of a string either through sound or 'touch'?  I need to measure vibrations between about 30 and 3000 cycles per second.  It would need to be fairly accurate to within a few cps.

Alan Haddington, via email

I read your correspondence on piano tuning with interest as I make and sell a device for use with electronic tuners such as the Seiko used by Don Cahill. The electronic tuners are excellent and very accurate, but they often rely on a built in microphone to detect the note. This can often be rich in harmonics or accompanied by background noise, which confuses the tuner and can make the reading unreliable. My device is a metre long lead, which plugs into the tuner, cutting out the microphone, and a clip, which is clipped onto any part of an instrument where there are vibrations. This transmits only the fundamental note to the tuner and enables an instrument to be tuned anywhere, regardless of background noise.

I have sold mainly to guitar, fiddle, mandolin and banjo players, who need to tune in noisy places, but it will work with a piano - I've checked it on mine, and I only clipped it to the music stand on the front as I couldn't readily get inside. Details and more information are available from:

http://mysite.freeserve.com/thejumplead

Mike Tavener

TROUBLING TIMES

In view of the current international situation I wonder if anyone knows of a source of inexpensive Geiger counters?

J. Delaney, via email

If you can use a soldering iron you can buy Geiger counter kits from: http://www.imagesco.com/catalog/geiger/counter.html

Jesse Terry, via email

CAN YOU HELP

In Excel 97-2000 there was a function called LastValue, which could report the last entry in a row or column [=LastValue(C:C)].  This was very useful but it is not available in Office XP, and I cannot trace a function that will replace it. At present I have one workbook, which is saved in the old format. Is there any way in which the function can be imported or reproduced in Office XP, or that I can create it for myself?

Anne Woodford, via email

Can anyone suggest a database for storing recipes (without the need for programming skills) or an adaptable ready-made recipe program? I want to be able to scan in recipes from magazines, books, etc, to retain images, and sorting or searching by type, category etc. e.g. Starters, Main Course etc. Ideally it would also provide thumbnails of scans for easy identification, recall and printing.

J. E. Skeldon, via e-mail.

I work from home and have for some time rented two BT lines. One for incoming voice calls; the other for Internet and a dedicated fax machine. I would like to reduce to just one line, whilst retaining the discrete fax (rather than switching to a computer-based fax function). I tried a 'fax switch' some years ago but it proved useless. Does anyone have any suggestions as to how I can successfully manage phone, fax and answering functions on a single line?

Robin Wager, via email