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FAQS!
FACTS! FAX! 228 (07/09/00)
THE
MIRROR CRACKED
I
work with Word 97 and Publisher 98. I would like to use the special iron-on
paper in my printer that transfers onto fabric. The instructions on the
pack
says to set the printer to 'Reverse' or 'Mirror Writing', so that the transfer
is the correct way once ironed on to the fabric. This has me
stumped. I use a rather ancient HP Deskjet 560c printer and can find no
setting for this on any of the printer controls. Nor can I find any way
through Word or Publisher to produce mirror writing. The 'Flip' command
does not flip as the icon suggests - it merely rotates.
Louise
Walters, London N8
It
probably can be done in Word and Publisher but life’s too short and there’s a
much easier way to create mirror writing by using Windows Paint (Start >
Programs > Accessories). Click the Text icon, type in your message then go
to the Image menu, select Flip/Rotate, check Horizontal and click OK.
REASON
TO RHYME
Being retired, and having nothing better to do I
spend hours on my word processor trying to write poetry. Is there a website
where I can find a list of words that rhyme, or do I mean rhyming words?
Bill Gill
Poetry
sites? No problem Bill
The
web is awash so have your fill
Here
are two addresses to start your quest
F!F!F!
readers, feel free to suggest
(perhaps
we’d better stick to solving PC problems…)
http://rhyme.lycos.com/
http://www.hphoward.demon.co.uk
/poetry/rpolink.htm
Incidentally,
the second site contains a couple of rhyming dictionaries and lots of
useful-looking poetry resources.
EXCEL
ANSWER
In
response to John Cane’s request for an Excel viewer (F!F!F! August 24th),
have a look at this page for Excel 2000:
http://www.officeupdate.com
/2000/downloadDetails/xlviewer.htm
or this one for Excel 97 files:
http://www.officeupdate.com
/downloadDetails/xlviewer.htm
Roy Venkatesh
Many
thanks for those suggestions
SPLIT
DECISION
I
was running Windows 95 on my laptop with a 6 gigabyte hard disk drive
partitioned across drives C, D & E; each of 2 gigabytes. Following the
instructions in Boot Camp (18th November 1999) I formatted my hard drive and installed Windows 98 in place of 95. Everything went well and it
works,perfectly, however, my hard disk remains resolutely split. How do I combine
these three 'drives' into one C drive?
Tony Nicholas
You
cannot change disc partitions from within Windows but there are a number of
utility programs on the market that can do the job, the best-known being Symantec
Partition-IT Extra Strength and Power Quest’s Partition Magic. However it’s a
bit of a palaver and unless the partitioning is causing you problems it’s
usually a good idea to leave well alone.
MORE
TROLLEY TIPS
There's
an even easier way to send a quick repetitive message in Outlook Express, to alert employees to the arrival of the sandwich trolley (F!F!F!
August 24th), and that's to use the signature facility. Go to Tools
- Options, select Signature tab. Click on new - enter text (e.g. sandwich
trolley is here), give signature a name and apply. When requiring to use this
facility, open Outlook Express, New Mail, go to Insert then Signature, call up
the above saved signature, and then Send.
David Dawson-Taylor
There
is a better way to achieve an email with a specific subject. The following tag
on an HTML page will create an email ready to be sent.
Just select the shortcut, then press send.
mailto:sandwiches@royalblue.com
?subject=The sandwich
trolley is here
Alternatively, the above attachment, placed on the desktop
and suitably amended, should also work.
Tim Sneller
We’re
not wholly convinced these methods are any easier than our original desktop
shortcut suggestion but thanks anyway.
DESIST
ASSISTANT
Whenever writing a letter using Microsoft Word 97 a
panel appears informing me that I am writing a letter and offering help.
I know what I am doing and don't want any help. How can I change the
default setting so this prompt does not appear?
Michael Birch
This
is the handiwork of the infuriating Office Assistant. You should be able to
stop it appearing by clicking on the Office Assistant icon (box with a question
mark) then selecting the Options tab and de-selecting ‘Display Alerts’.
However, that doesn’t always work so for a more permanent solution open Windows
Explorer and work your way to: Windows/Program Files/Microsoft Office/Office,
right-click on the folder called Actors then rename it ‘Dead_Actors’.
SUN
SITE
I would love to be able to have a map of the world programme on my computer
that would show the passage of the sun's light moving across the earth
during each 24-hour period; my searching to date has proved fruitless.
Pamela
Joyce
There’s
an excellent shareware program called Geoclock, which will do everything you
want and much more, it can even be set as a screensaver. The program is quite
small (around 650kb) and can be downloaded from:
http://home.att.net/~geoclock/
It’s
in the form of a ‘zip’ file, so you may need an ‘unzipping’ program such as,
WinZip and Pkzip, both of which can be downloaded from shareware like www.tucows.com and www.jumbo.com
UNLOADING
THE TRAY
I seem to have accumulated a lot of icons in the
System Tray by the clock, presumably from installing different software over
the years. How do I remove those I do not want? I believe they take up small
amounts of memory so added together will slow down my computer, as well as
taking longer to boot up.
Phil Hanson
The
Windows 98 CD-ROM contains an unsupported utility called QuickTray to help you
manage your System Tray. It’s one of a number of useful programs included in
the Win 98 ‘Resource Kit’. To load it pop in your Windows installation disc
(hold down the Shift key to stop the Windows installation program starting).
Next, launch Windows Explorer then open the Tools and Reskit folders double
click on Setup.exe and the Reskit will be installed on your PC. It’s all fairly
straightforward but to find out how to use QuickTray or any of the other Reskit
utilities click on the Win98rk.hlp icon that appears in the newly created
Win98RK folder, listed under Program Files.
Alternatively,
if you are using Windows 95 try a nifty little program called Tray Manager, it
can be downloaded from most shareware sites.
ALL
OF A QUIVER
Do
you know of any websites about archery in the UK? My Father tried Archery
whilst on holiday and wants some more information. We have looked but can't find anything.
Daniel
Charmer
That’s
odd, using the keywords ‘Archery’ and ‘Archery UK’ in search engines like
AltaVista and Lycos threw up scores of hits, here are three sites with plenty
of links to all aspects of the sport.
http://www.archery-association.org/
http://www.gnas.org/pages/archeryuk.htm
http://www.paulsarcherywebsite.co.uk/
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