HOUSECALL information technology

The internet is full of free software and can be hard to find applications that are useful amongst all the rubble. Audacity is a genuine diamond in the rough, an exceptional audio recording and editing software.

The program is even used by Speech-Language Pathologists to record and analyze variations in accents and voice disorders. It also has a number of other features and possibilities for other lines of work, including:

Recording live audio.
Converting tapes and records into digital recordings or CDs.
Editing Ogg Vorbis, MP3, WAV, and AIFF sound files.
Cutting, copying, splicing or mixing sounds together.
Changing the speed or pitch of a recording.
Removing static, hiss, hum, or other constant background noises.
Quickly editing even large audio files.
And more!

Audacity is available for Windows, Mac OS, and Linux/Unix operating systems. To see if your computer will run Audacity, view the system requirements for Windows, Mac, and Linux.

Once you’ve determined that Audacity will run on your system, go to the download page to install Audacity. Be sure and click on your operating system to download the correct file. Follow the instructions provided for installing the program.

After you’ve installed Audacity, you can try recording a file. Open audacity and hit the record button (the red circle). You will need a microphone to record your own voice. To stop recording, you can press pause (the two blue rectangles) or stop (the yellow square) but note that they work differently. If you press pause and then press record again, you will start recording right where you left off. But if you press stop, Audacity will create a new sound layer, and once you press record again it will start from the beginning. For example if I recorded myself whistling a tune and then pressed stop, and pressed record again and sang the tune, when I played it I would hear myself singing and whistling the tune at the same time. When you record the second layer, you can hear what’s playing in the first layer when you record.

You can also use Audacity to edit audio files that were recorded by other means. Audacity can open most any type of audio file. M4P is a common file type that is an exception. If you want to open an M4P file you will need to convert it, which you can do in iTunes by following the instructions here.

Once you’re finished with your file you will need to save it. If you might want to continue working on it in the future, you should save it as an Audacity file to keep the layers in tact. To do this, go to the File menu and choose Save Project. If you want to distribute the file, by burning it to a CD, emailing it to a friend, or putting it on your webpage, you will need to export it as a common type of file. Otherwise people will only be able to listen to it if they have Audacity.

Here are the types of files that you can use to export your completed Audacity projects:

Ogg Vorbis – A free and un-patented audio compression format used for storing and playing digital music, similar to the MP3. For more information, see the vorbis website. To export to this type of file, go to the File menu and select Export as Ogg Vorbis.
MP3 – The standard for storing and playing digital music and other audio files. To export to an MP3 file you will first need to download and install the LAME MP3 encoder. Follow the instructions here. Be sure to download the correct version for your operating system. Once it is installed, export to MP3 in Audacity by going to the File menu and selecting Export as MP3.
WAV – An audio format that uses raw or uncompressed audio and is ideal for creating audio CDs. To export to this type of file in Audacity, go to the File menu and chose Export to WAV.

Want to do more with Audacity? The Audacity Wiki includes a page filled with tutorials for creating all sorts of projects with Audacity. Many off-site tutorials are included as well.

We detected irregular activity to your account on 01/29/10 at 6:15pm.

As part of our continuing commitment to protect your account and to reduce the instance of fraud on our website, we are undertaking a period review of our member accounts.

This email is to notify you that you have a new message in your Secure Online Mailbox from Customer Service in response to your inquiry.

The above examples are taken directly from phishing emails. Phishing is a form of identity theft in which criminals use deceptive emails to separate you from your login information in order to eventually separate you from your finances or other secure information.

How to Detect a Phishing Email

Asking for Personal Information

Since the purpose of phishing is to obtain your login information for nefarious purposes, the phishing email will attempt to convince you that you need to login to your account for some reason or another. Common reasons include:

Your account is going to close and you need your personal information to open it.
“Suspicious” or “irregular” or “fraudulent” activity has been detected in your account and you need to login to find out what it is.
You have a piece of information waiting for you in your account and you must login to retrieve it.
You have won a contest and you need to login to claim your prize.

Don’t let phishing companies “lure” you into providing your information. If you think the email might be legitimate, call the organization but make sure you do not call any phone number provided in the questionable email! For instance if you think the email is from your bank, call a number for your bank that you already know to be legitimate.

If you have a HouseCall Systems Administrator we would be happy to take a look at any email you think is suspicious.

Disguising Themselves as a Reputable Website

Phishing companies know that you are too smart to give your personal information to a website that is unfamiliar, so they disguise themselves as websites you trust such as Paypal, eBay, or even your bank.

Web addresses can be disguised in emails. The email can write out the address www.ebay.com but then have it link to another website that will steal your information. The phishing websites can copy the design of the reputable websites. They can also send you to legitimate websites and then display a pop-up that asks you to login there and take your information that way.

Pretending to be a Potential Employer

A recent technique of phishing scams targets people on job seeking websites. The emails pretend to be an interested employer and ask for personal information, such as a social security number. You should always be careful when giving out your social security number to anyone.

Things You Can Do

Always make sure you have anti-virus software running on your computer and that it is up to date. Sometimes phishing emails contain spyware that monitors your activity on your computer in attempt to gain information about you that can be used for malicious purposes. Be cautious when downloading any attachments.

Turn the spam filter on your email account. If you are a HouseCall client we are happy to assist you in doing so. Remember that no spam filters are perfect and even if your spam filter is turned on some phishing emails can slip through the cracks.

Never respond to an email asking you for personal information, such as your social security number, a PIN number, or your password. Your HouseCall Systems Administrator will never email you asking for you password.

If you receive a phishing email you can report it by forwarding it to spam@uce.gov as well as the organization that the phishing email is attempting to impersonate.

If you think you may be a victim of phishing or identity theft, you can file a complaint with the FTC. You should check your credit report to make sure that no one is opening accounts under your name. You are entitled to a free credit report every year. To obtain yours visit annualcreditreport.com.

For more information visit the Federal Trade Commission’s information on Phishing scams.

Changing your desktop background or “wallpaper” is an easy way to customize your computer. Best of all, you can change it as often as you’d like without having to peel the old layer or get your hands sticky by using any special glue.

Many people like to use photos that they have taken with their digital cameras so their desktop can become a virtual picture frame of family members, friends, and favorite animals. To do this, simply find the photo you want to use as your desktop background and right click it. On a Windows PC, select “Set as Desktop Background.” On a Mac, select “Set Desktop Picture.”

Once that step is finished, you will be presented with a few options as to how you want your image to appear. On the Mac you will need to click the button that says “Open Desktop Preferences.” You can play around with the settings until you find the one you like.

On a Mac:

You can pick fill screen or stretch to fill screen for an image that might be too small for your screen. This stretches it so it covers the entire screen. Sometimes it makes the image look a little distorted.
Choose center if you have an image that is smaller than your screen that you want to center on the screen. This will leave the edges around the image blank and you can chose what color you want it to be.  Fit to screen is similar, but it re-sizes the image.
Tile allows you to take a small image and have it repeat across the desktop.

On a PC:

Choose center if you have an image that is smaller than your screen that you want to center on the screen. This will leave the edges around the image blank and you can chose what color you want it to be.
You can pick stretch to re-size an image that might be too small for your screen and stretch it so it covers the entire screen. Sometimes it makes the image look a little distorted.
Tile allows you to take a small image and have it repeat across the desktop.

If you have a Mac or Windows 7 you can do even more with your wallpaper. Both operating systems have a feature that rotates your wallpaper between all the photos in a different folder. For instance, if you have a photo of a tree, a flower, and a kitten in a folder you’ll start off with the tree photo as your wallpaper, then in 30 minutes (or however long you specify) it will automatically switch to the flower, and then 30 minutes later it will switch to the kitten.

To do this on a Mac:

1. Right click your desktop and select “Change Desktop Background.”
2. Next, select what folder you want to chose. Under “Apple” your Mac has a preset list of folders with backgrounds. For instance, the “Nature” folder will rotate between different backgrounds with a nature theme. You can also choose different events from iPhoto. If you have a photo of images on your computer you want to use, click the “+” button to browse for that folder. You can see all the images in the folder on the left.
3. Right under where you can see the images in the folder, check the box that says “Change Picture:”
4. Select how often you want the picture to change by clicking on the drop down menu.
5. Close the window to save your changes.

To do this in Windows 7:

(Image Source: http://www.intowindows.com/how-to-customize-a-windows-7-theme-detailed-guide)

1. Click the Start button, and then click “Control Panel.”
2. Click “Change Desktop Background.”
3. Click the “Picture Location” menu to find the pictures you want to rotate. All the pictures have to be in the same folder.
4. To change how often the pictures rotate, click the drop-down menu under “Change Picture Every” and select the amount of time you would prefer.
5. When you are finished, click “Save Changes” and close the control panel.

For more information, view the video here.

Looking for something fun and interesting to use as your desktop background? Check out these sources:

National Geographic – Take your wallpaper directly from the pages of National Geographic magazine!
Vlad Studio – Cute, mostly seasonal themed wallpaper.
Flickr Wallpaper – Hundreds of beautiful wallpaper from Flickr’s wallpaper pool.

Computers, like everything else in the world, get dirty. While your workststion starts off looking shiny and new, you will eventually notice crumbs in the keyboard, smudges on the monitor, and lots of dust. Thankfully, there are simple things you can do to keep your computer looking spiffy.

Watch What You Eat
Eating in front of your computer is about as common these days as eating in front of the television. Unlike the television, crumbs can easily get into unwanted places, particularly your keyboard. If you decide to eat at your desk, make sure to not take bites and chew over your keyboard particularly if you’re eating something that makes a lot of crumbs.

Spills are even more devastating and most often end up on your keyboard. If you spill something on your keyboard turn your computer off right away and then turn the keyboard upside down. Shake the upside down keyboard gently over something that you don’t mind if it gets wet. Keeping the keyboard upside down, clean off what you can with a dry cloth. Then leave your keyboard unused and upside down overnight to dry.

More Keyboard Tips
For cleaning crumbs out of your keyboard you can use a can of compressed air or a vacuum attachment. Spray the compressed air between the keys to dislodge crumbs, dirt, and other particles. If you use a vacuum make sure that your keys do not pop off easily as they could get sucked up!

If your keyboard is used by multiple people it’s a good idea to disinfect it occasionally. Spray disinfectant on a cloth or dampen a cloth with rubbing alcohol and then gently rub the keys. Always unplug your keyboard before cleaning it.

Keep Your Monitor Shiny
When cleaning your monitor, make sure you never spray it directly with water or any cleaning solution. Usually a dry cloth will do the job. Use a microfiber or any lint free cloth. Special cloths designed for cleaning electronics are available.

If your monitor is particularly dirty, you can use water or rubbing alcohol. Just make sure you dampen the cloth first and then wipe the monitor down instead of applying the liquid directly to the monitor. You do not need to drench the cloth; a tiny bit of moisture will do.

A Clean Mouse is a Happy Mouse
Mice can get gunk built up on the bottom which causes them to run less smoothly. The best thing you can do to clean them off is first unplug the mouse from the computer. Then dampen a lint free cloth with rubbing alcohol and wipe the gunk off the bottom of the mouse. If you use a mouse pad, you can wipe it down as well.

Today most people use optical mice that light up on the bottom. If you have a mechanical mouse with a ball inside, here is an excellent video on how to clean it.

Cleaning the Inside
The internal components of your PC can easily get dusty. Cleaning out the dust helps your computer to run more quickly and quietly.

Important: Make sure your computer is turned off and unplugged before you clean it! You do not want to disrupt any of the components while they are in use.

Once the computer is powered down you will need to open up the case. Different brands and models of PC open in different ways. If you feel uncomfortable opening your computer or are unsure of how to do so, ask your systems administrator to take care of this for you.

Use compressed air to spray the dust out of your computer. You do not have to touch any of the internal components. Unlike a keyboard, using a vacuum to clean the inside of your computer is not a good idea as it could generate static electricity and damage your computer. You might want to wear a mask if the inside is particularly dirty to keep from inhaling the dust.

The outside of your computer can be cleaned as well. Simply wipe it down with a damp cloth.

Keeping your computer clean is easy. It not only keeps your computer running more efficiently but it can also keep you healthier. It looks much nicer, too!

(source for portions of this blog: http://www.computerhope.com/cleaning.htm)

Blackberries are small which makes them easy to lose. Having your blackberry lost or stolen is worrisome enough without being concerned about your emails, notes, schedule, and contacts in the hands of others. Password protection is the best thing you can do to keep your information from being used maliciously.

If you currently do not have password protection enabled on your blackberry it’s very easy to do.

• Instructions for a blackberry Tour or blackberry Curve 2
• Instructions for an 8830 World Edition blackberry or a blackberry Curve
• More password options

Instructions for a blackberry Tour or blackberry Curve 2

1. Go to the options on your blackberry. This icon usually looks like a wrench.

2. Scroll down and select Password.

3. Click the menu button on your blackberry and select Set Password.

4. You will be prompted to choose a password. We suggest making passwords that are at least four characters long. You can use numbers, letters, and symbols in your password.

NOTE: When creating a password, you automatically use the letters on the blackberry keyboard. If you want the password to be numbers, you must hold down the “alt” key when you type the numbers you want. If you hold down the capital key, the letters will be capitalized, and passwords are case sensitive! It may seem like it doesn’t make a difference, but it will make a huge difference when you sync your blackberry with your computer!

5. Enter the password you just created a second time.

6. Hit the menu button and click save when you’re finished.

Instructions for an 8830 World Edition blackberry or a blackberry Curve

1. Go to the options on your blackberry. This icon usually looks like three controls in green, red, and blue, as shown below. Sometimes it looks like a wrench.

2. Scroll down and select Security Options.

3. Select General Settings.

4. At the top you should see the word Password followed by the word Disabled. Click where it says Disabled and change the option to Enabled. Click the menu button and select save.

5. You will be prompted to choose a password. We suggest making passwords that are at least four characters long. You can use numbers, letters, and symbols in your password.

NOTE: When creating a password, you automatically use the letters on the blackberry keyboard. If you want the password to be numbers, you must hold down the “alt” key when you type the numbers you want. If you hold down the capital key, the letters will be capitalized, and passwords are case sensitive! It may seem like it doesn’t make a difference, but it will make a huge difference when you sync your blackberry with your computer!

6. Enter the password you just created a second time.

7. Hit the menu button and click save when you’re finished.

More Password Options

You can change your password options in the password tab on the blackberry Tour and blackberry Curve 2 and in the general settings tab on the 8830 World Edition blackberry and the blackberry Curve:

Number of Password Attempts: This selects how many incorrect attempts you are allowed before the blackberry wipes itself. We suggest allowing for 10 attempts. It’s easy to make typos on the blackberry’s small keyboard.

Security Timeout: This is how long you can go without using your blackberry before it prompts for your password again. Keep it at 10 minutes at most.

Prompt on Application Install: Selecting “yes” will tell your blackberry to ask for your password anytime you try to install a new app.

Lock Handheld Upon Holstering: This will turn on password protection as soon as you put your blackberry in its holster regardless of how long it has been since you used it.

Allow Outgoing Calls While Locked: If you have phone service enabled on your blackberry this setting determines if you can make calls when the blackberry is locked. Keep this set to No. You do not want someone else using up all your minutes or calling your contacts!

Be sure and hit the menu button and click save when you’re finished.

Having a password on your blackberry may seem annoying at first, but having someone with malicious intentions accessing your information is much worse. You will get used to putting your password in soon enough. Your fingers wont even have to think about it!

According to Technorati’s State of the Blogosphere 2009 report, around 900,000 blog posts are uploaded in a twenty-four hour period. If you’re an avid blog reader it can be tricky to stay up-to-date  without feeling overwhelmed. It’s easy to accidentally skip a blog and a critical piece of information. You also might find yourself continually refreshing the page on a favorite blog as you wait for a new update. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could read the new posts for all your favorite blogs in one place?

You can, and the answer is Real Simple Syndication (or RSS for short). RSS is just as easy as the name implies—it allows you to subscribe to your favorite blogs and read them all in one place. It’s like subscribing to your favorite magazines instead of waiting for them to show up on the newsstand.

Almost all blogs have an RSS feed, which is a version of the blog in special simplified format of just the important content like text, links, and images. Blog readers can subscribe to a blog by clicking on the link for the feed, which is usually labeled something like “Subscribe Here” or “RSS Feed.” The RSS logo is also often used, and looks like this:

Once you click the link you will be asked what RSS reader you want to use to subscribe. RSS readers are also known as news aggregators or simply aggregators. RSS readers gather all the posts of your favorite blogs that you subscribe to in one place. Each individual post is called a news item. There are many RSS readers available and some of the best ones are free:

Built-In Readers
Many applications you already use have built-in RSS readers including Microsoft Outlook and Internet Explorer, Apple Safari and Apple Mail, and Mozilla Firefox (through a feature called Live Bookmarks).

Note: Some built-in readers require you to copy the URL of the RSS feed. This is found at the top of your browser where you would type in the address of a webpage. Click on the RSS link for anything you want to subscribe to and then copy the URL.

FeedDemon
FeedDemon is a very popular full-featured feed reader for Windows. Some of the many things FeedDemon can do include tagging items with your own keywords, automatically downloading podcasts, and alerting you when a keyword you specified pops up in a new news item. It is a stand-alone application, which means you don’t have to use any other programs (such as a web browser) to use it. FeedDemon is considered very east to use with its intuitive user interface.

NetNewsWire
NetNewsWire is created by the same people as FeedDemon, a company called NewsGator. The feed reader is popular with many Mac OSX users for being a powerful yet easy to use stand-alone application. Features include multiple viewing options, the ability to save items as HTML, and the capacity for tracking information and automatically determining which feeds are most important to you.

Google Reader
Google Reader allows you to read your favorite blogs all together in your web browser on your computer or your smartphone. It uses the same login as the rest of your google account and links you with all of your gmail contacts so you can share news stories with your friend. If you use gmail the user interface will seem familiar. A popular feature of Google Reader marks new items as read as you scroll down the page. You can also quickly star items that are important to you.

Bloglines
Another popular feed reader that works in your browser is called Bloglines. Bloglines has some great features like notifications, which is an add-on for your browser that notifies you when a new item is added to your feed. It has a mobile version that looks great on smartphones and it provides stellar recommendations on new feeds that might be of interest to you.

When most people think of RSS feeds blogs come to mind but you can subscribe to other things online as well.

Google News Alerts
You can add Google News items to your RSS reader on any topic or search term. Simply go to news.google.com and type in a search term. You might search for “technology” or the name of your favorite politician. Then down at the bottom of the page you will see a link titled “RSS” with the orange RSS logo next to it. Click on the link to choose your RSS reader or copy the RSS link at the top.

Craigslist Searches
RSS is a great way to find a new apartment, job, or flat screen TV on Craigslist. Go to the city of your choice and enter your search terms. On the lower right-hand corner of the screen and find the orange box with the words “RSS.” Click it and just like subscribing to a blog.

As we inch closer to 2010, HouseCall remains committed to keeping our clients informed on ways to ever improve efficiently by utilizing the best technology on the market.  In this effort, we would like to share with you a few gems of technology that may make your workday more efficient in the New Year.

Flip Video Camcorder

This is not your father’s camcorder. The Flip is small, super-portable, and very easy to use. The Ultra HD model ($199.99) allows for up to 120 minutes of HD quality video. It’s perfect for on the fly captures of speeches and presentations, yet has high quality video that looks perfectly professional.

Uploading videos with the Flip is easy. The Flip plugs directly into your computer with USB and comes with software for easy video editing. The software also makes it simple to upload videos directly to YouTube.

Plantronics Wireless Headset

The Plantronics CS55 Wireless Headset ($255.00) is perfect for anyone who spends a great deal of time on the phone. Holding the receiver to your face is painful after a while and doing work one handed can be difficult. Wireless technology and battery life of up to 10 hours allows you to talk on the phone while roaming around up to 300 feet. You can even answer and end calls while you’re away from your desk.

If you’re interested in purchasing a Plantronics headset feel free to contact us.

Kindle

Having a Kindle from Amazon ($259.00) is like having an entire library (up to 1,500 books!) that weighs only 10.2 ounces. Not only can you read books on the Kindle, but you can also subscribe to newspapers like the Washington Post. The Kindle will even read text to you. Best of all, there’s no glare or backlight so it’s more like reading from a page than a computer screen.

Going Green: Consume less paper by reading important PDFs on your Kindle instead of printing them out.

LaCie iamaKey

Flash drives (also known as thumb drives or USB drives) quickly made floppy disks obsolete by allowing people to easily store and transport more data in a smaller item. The only downside to the small size is how easily it can get lost. The LaCie iamaKey (starting at $21.99 for 4GB) solves that problem by creating a flash drive that is key-shaped so you can attach it to your keyring. Now all you have to do is remember where you put your keys!

Acer Aspire One Netbook

Netbooks are perfect for computing anywhere. It’s small enough to take with you on a plane, on the metro, at work, and at home. The Acer Aspire One is our top choice with the solid hardware necessary for on the go use. With a 10.1” WSVGA CrystalBrite LED backlit LCD screen and a Intel Atom processor N270 you can do anything anywhere. Choose from one of four colors to match your style.

CardScan Executive

Where are all the business cards that you’ve collected over the years? If you’re like most people, they’re probably in a box on your desk taking up space and waiting for the day when you’ll have time to enter each contact into Outlook. If your job is like most jobs, you know that day will never come. CardScan Executive ($259.99) will scan your business cards, extract the important text, and with a click of the mouse transfer that information straight to Outlook. CardScan will process up to 15 cards a minute in color. No one can type that fast! CardScan is also available for Mac.

Adobe Premier Elements

Sometimes free video editing software such as Windows Movie Maker and iMovie isn’t quite enough. Adobe Premier Elements ($99.99) is a popular and affortable software for editing and perfecting videos. This software gives you the opportunity to create clean and professional videos easily: add titles, automatically remove bad footage, include transitions, create picture-in-picture effects, add animations, and more.

Apple Magic Mouse

Adding the scroll wheel to the top of a mouse was smart, but the Apple Magic Mouse ($69.00) is brilliant. It brings the multitouch experience from the iPhone to your mouse. Instead of manipulating the scroll wheel you just slide your fingers on top of the mouse to scroll in any direction. The rest of it works like a regular mouse–you just move it around with your hand and click.

Interested in getting a new Mac to go with the Apple Magic Mouse? Contact us and we’ll see what we can put together!

Sharing media has come along way since slide projectors that had to be setup and transported. Today media sharing is free and easy and can be done online. The most popular video sharing site is YouTube. You’ve probably watched funny videos of cats on this website before. Individuals, businesses and other organizations use YouTube to share information through videos. Flickr is the most popular photo-sharing site, and you don’t have to be a professional photographer to take advantage of the amazing service it offers.

There are a few reasons why using Flickr and YouTube to share media instead of merely adding it to your website is a good idea:

1. Uploading photos and movies is incredibly easy. YouTube accepts eight different common video formats including those used by iMovie and Windows Movie Maker. Flickr automatically resizes large photos into reasonable sizes and creates thumbnails.
2. Embedding movies from YouTube is a lot easier than manually adding them to your website. Once your video is uploaded to YouTube you just have to paste the code provided on your website. Flickr offers a few options for adding photos to your website, including badges that display your most recent photos.
3. Using Flickr and YouTube increases exposure to your photos and videos. People that don’t know about your website might find your video on YouTube or your photo on Flickr and visit your website from there. For instance, if someone were looking for videos of sailboats, they might go straight to YouTube and search for sailboats instead of going to a sailboat related website and searching for videos.

To sign up for a Flickr account, you will need a free Yahoo account. If you don’t have one already, sign up here. Once you have your yahoo account, click the “Create Your Account” button on Flickr’s website and follow the simple instructions. Once you’ve signed up you can start uploading photos right away. The Flickr Uploader is software for PC and Mac that makes adding photos incredibly easy. Take the Flickr tour for more information on the features Flickr offers.

YouTube requires a Google account to sign up. You can sign up for your free Google account here. With your Google account ready, click here to create a YouTube account. Once you’re done, uploading videos is easy and adding your videos on your webpage is simple, too. All you need to do is find the “embed” link in the information box to the left of the video. You can see the imbed link at the bottom of the screenshot here:

Just copy what’s in the box and paste it where you would like the video to appear on your website.

That’s all there is to it! YouTube and Flickr make uploading and sharing photos and videos easy and much more fun than a slide projector.

Having an organized inbox is just as important as keeping a clean workspace. But, if you’re getting hundreds of emails daily, it can be difficult to find time to sort through your many messages. Outlook and other email applications can help you keep your inbox tidy and highlight the important information with rules.

In Outlook, rules are a set of conditions, actions, and exceptions that process and organize messages automatically. Rules are completely customizable to your specific needs and can do many functions that help organize, customize and clean your mailbox. To create a rule for your mailbox, look in the tools menu bar for “Rules and Alerts” and open it. Here, Outlook lets you decide whether to create a rule using a pre-created template or to create a new rule from scratch. While the pre-created templates can be useful, creating a rule from scratch gives you the most flexibility and is what we recommend.

Since there are countless options for creating a rule, we will use an example to explain the process:

Say you want to create a rule that will automatically put all the emails you receive with the word “finance” in the subject into a folder labeled “Financial Information” in your personal folders. Find where it says “Start from a blank rule.” Then choose “Check messages when they arrive.” This tells Outlook to check the emails you receive as opposed to the ones you send. Click next. Check the box next to “with specific words in the subject.” Here you’re telling Outlook to look in the subject line for a specific word or phrase. Other options include looking for emails sent from a specific person, or sent to a certain email address—if you want to sort out emails that are sent to a distribution list you’re on. By clicking the blue underlined “specific words” at the bottom of the page it will let you customize which words you want to specify. Type in “finance” and click add. Now this rule will run on any email that arrives in your inbox with the word finance in the subject. Click OK to return to the previous box and click next.

Now you will designate what you want done with the emails. Check the box next to “move it to the specified folder.” You will need to specify which folder to send it to by clicking on “specified” at the bottom of the dialogue box. Choose the folder in the personal folders labeled “Financial Information” (you will need to create the folder you want the messages to go in beforehand) and click OK to set that option and then click next. This brings us to the exceptions. For the example, we’ll say that you would like this rule only to apply to those messages sent directly to me, if you are being CC’ed they will stay in your Inbox. Choose the box next to “except where my name is in the CC box” and hit next. The rule is now set up! You can now decide whether to run this rule on the emails in that are already in your inbox. This will move any emails in your inbox that follow the rule into the specified folder. You can also choose to turn on or leave it off for the time being. Rules and alerts are only active if they are checked in the “Rules and Alerts” box and the rules you set up will only be active when your Outlook is open.

There are many rules and alerts to customize and we suggest that you utilize this feature to improve efficiency and minimize your workload. For more information and tips on using rules, check out Tips for Managing Your E-Mail Using Rules from Microsoft Office Online.

Please contact us for assistance or further information for other email applications, including Entourage, Apple Mail, etc.

Anyone working in today’s environment will have opened many PDF files from email attachments or downloaded from the Internet. PDFs can be opened on any computer using Adobe’s free PDF reader software Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is most likely already on your computer. Reading a PDF is effortless, but what about you want to create one? You might want to create a PDF to distribute a document while making sure no one edits your work. Small file size is another reason to create a PDF. A PDF is usually smaller than the same document would be in Microsoft Word. The process for creating a PDF is different than you might expect, but it’s easy and there are a few different methods depending on what operating system and software you’re using.

You can create a PDF out of just about anything that is printable, including pages from the Internet. You can convert any file into PDF using familiar software such as Microsoft Word or Publisher, software from the Open Office suite, or Apple’s iWork software to name a few. You can create a PDF by printing to PDF. This may sound strange since printing usually involves creating hard copies of documents on the tray of a printer. It may help if you think about a PDF as a “digital hard copy.” If you created a document, spreadsheet, or presentation, The PDF is the final draft of your work. But, instead of distributing it the old fashioned way, you can distribute it electronically.

A handy example of printing to PDF is anytime you need to keep a record of something you see on the internet, like a page indicating your receipt for a recent purchase.  Instead of printing the receipt on paper, you can opt to print it as a PDF and keep a digital copy on your designated hard drive.  It is much easier to keep a digital folder of receipts than just a paper folder.

Adobe Acrobat Professional
Adobe Acrobat Professional (Acrobat Pro) allows you to not only create PDFs but also offers tools for doing more with your PDFs such creating PDF forms. The software is powerful, but expensive. If you have Acrobat Pro installed on your computer, you can easily print to PDF. When you are finished with the document you want to turn into a PDF, go to the File menu and then select Print, or you may “save as” a PDF. (If you are using Microsoft Office 2007, you will go to the Office menu instead.) You will see the usual screen with printer options, including selecting a printer from the drop-down menu. From the drop down menu select “Adobe PDF” and choose where you want to save your PDF. Then click Save. It will take a few seconds or longer to create the PDF depending on the size of your document. When the PDF is created, it will open in Acrobat Pro. If you choose to “save as” a PDF, you will be prompted for a PDF file name similar to printing in PDF.

CutePDF
Printing to PDF using CutePDF works the same way as using Acrobat Pro. CutePDF is a free application that can be downloaded from the Internet. (Note: Always check with your Systems Administrator before downloading software from the Internet.) If you are a HouseCall client, CutePDF should already be installed on your computer. When you’re ready, go to the File or Office menu and then select Print. The printer options screen will appear, including a drop-down menu of the printers installed on your PC. From the drop down menu, select “CutePDF Writer” and choose where you want to save your PDF. Then click Save. It will take a few seconds or longer to create the PDF depending on the size of your document. When the PDF is created, you will find it in the folder you selected.

Office 2007
With Microsoft Office 2007 installed on your computer you can create PDFs from your Office files using an extension that you can download and install here. Once the extension is installed, creating a PDF from your Office 2007 document is easy. Just go to the Office menu and go to Save As and select Save As PDF or XPS. Select the folder where you would like to save the PDF. Make sure the Save as Type is set to PDF. Click Publish. Your new PDF will automatically open in your default PDF viewer, most likely Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Mac OS X
If you use a Mac and have OS X 10.4 (Tiger) or later (this includes Leopard and Snow Leopard) you do not need any additional software to create PDFs. With the document you want to turn into a PDF open, simply go to the File menu and select Print. A window with options will appear. Click the button labeled PDF in the lower left hand corner. From the drop down menu click Save as PDF. Choose where you want to save your PDF and click save. You will find the PDF in the folder you selected.

Going Green: The more you accomplish your goals by just printing PDF, the less paper you will consume.

If you have any questions or if you are interested in any of the software mentioned feel free to contact your HouseCall Systems Administrator.