Permanently Deleting in Outlook

Hi! When you delete an email message, a task, a calendar entry or a note in Outlook, the item is placed in the 'Deleted' folder. That's not necessarily a problem...but it could be.

Outlook's performance - in fact, whether or not it works at all - is directly impacted by the number and size of the messages and entries in the program. As you approach about 10,000 messages in total across all your folders (not including the archives), Outlook begins to act badly and could, in some cases, stop accepting new emails. And if you have large attachments with your messages, it's even more serious!

By default, Outlook keeps everything in one outlook.pst file: messages, calendar entries, contacts, etc. When that file gets too big, Outlook will warn you and ask you to clean up your mailbox (I'll do a post on the cleanup process...a task for another day!). This entry is all about a simple keystroke that permanently deletes your selected item(s).

When you delete things from the deleted folder, they are permanently deleted. They are not in the recycle bin; they are gone. You can bypass the Deleted folder and delete things directly by holding the Shift key when you delete. Whether you use the delete key on your keyboard or the delete icon on the toolbar, holding the Shift key down when you execute the command permanently deletes the entry. Outlook warns you with this message:



If you click 'yes', the entry does not go in your deleted folder and it's *poof* gone.

When you select multiple messages and use shift-delete, they are all permanently deleted. I use this a lot for my incoming junk mail.

So from now on, when you delete stuff you don't need, use shift-delete to get rid of em permanently.

Hardcover Photo Book Sale!

Hi! Last September, I told you about a photograph website that is very cool. Winkflash is a photo sharing and printing service that produces excellent quality photo prints, posters, cards, and books directly from your photos that you upload to it's website. I've been using them for years (and they are not paying me to do this either!) and have always been very pleased with the results.

They have a special offer that's pretty amazing: you can get a hardcover book of up to 100 pages for a flat rate of less than $20!

You can set up the book any way you want, with one or more photos on each page, with or without captions, and in many different layouts. The site is simple to use and they have online chat help if you need it (I used the chat help and the person knew what s/he was doing).

You can upload your photos to Winkflash and share the folders with friends for free. I've made photo greeting cards there as well as 2'x3' posters; everything has been top quality.

The flat rate book deal is a winner. If you have digital photographs, you can make a book for a friend or relative; it's a great gift! For the grandparents; for family in distant places. I've made a couple of books of my photos as coffee table books.

The flat rate deal is on until January 27th...click here to go to the winkflash website.

I think you'll like it a lot!

iPod Headphones

Hi. If you have an iPod or other music player, this post is for you. The headphones that came with your iPod are ok but, honestly, you're missing a lot of the music. I want to tell you that it's really worth it to upgrade and buy new headphones.

There are many styles and types of phones: over the ear, on the ear, ear buds, and inside the ear, for example. And you can spend hundreds of dollars on really great headsets.

I have the kind that go in my ear. They have soft moldable foam that I twist with my fingers and expand in my ears to block outside noise. The sound quality is amazing and I love that I can't hear outside stuff like engine noise and screaming kids on a plane! The ones is have are Shure SE110 and cost about $100.

I've had a headset from Costco that was about $75 and they were fine. I've tried the Bose and some off brand noise-cancelling phones but, for me, smaller and portable is better.

The point, though, is to trade up to better phones than the ones that came with your iPod. You'll really be glad you did!

Quick Outlook Shortcuts

Hi! I wish you all a happy, healthy and fun Christmas, whether you celebrate it or not!

If you use Outlook, you'll love this tip.

Usually we use the icons with a mouse to switch between mail, calendar, contacts, tasks and notes. If you memorize these shortcuts, you can move around really quickly and easily in Outlook:

• press ctrl + 1 for email
• press ctrl + 2 for calendar
• press ctrl + 3 for contacts
• press ctrl + 4 tasks
• press ctrl + 5 for notes

Like most Microsoft products, there are 3 ways to navigate in programs: icons, menus and keyboard shortcuts. In Outlook, you can click on the Go menu to see these shortcuts.

I use these all the time so I don't think about it any more. Keep them on a piece of paper near your keyboard and use them for a day or two and they'll be second nature for you too.

Tell your friends...they'll appreciate it!

Software Program Quick References

Hi. There are so many software programs we use it's hard to keep the commands straight in our minds so we can get our work done. We also don't have the time to learn about the sheer breadth of what's in each application.

There's a really cool website with reference guides on popular programs, both for PC & Mac. And it's free!

CustomGuide has assembled an assortment of quick references that are sure to make your computing life easier. Each program's guide shows the major commands and functions in a clear, easy to follow format. It's great to refresh your memory as well as learn some new functions. You'll find reference guides on Microsoft Office products like Outlook, Word and Excel and Adobe products like Acrobat and Photoshop.

Click here to visit CustomGuide to see the quick reference sheets available and be sure to print out the sheet for the programs you use regularly, as well as for the ones you want to learn! The guides are in pdf (acrobat) format so they look great every time!

Enjoy!

--
Michael Loewenberg
MESH Business Solutions, Inc.
tel 845-634-0200
check out the MESH Tech Blog for tips, tricks, shortcuts and recommendations about the technology you use today!
http://blog.meshbiz.com

Sending Photos from your Blackberry +

Hi! In July, I wrote about taking better photographs with your blackberry: you can see that post here. Today, we'll talk about sending photos to others from your blackberry.

When discussing using the camera on your blackberry, it's important that you have a media card installed. That way, your photos are stored on the card, not in the internal memory of your device. The internal memory is very limited and storing your photos there will seriously degrade the performance of your blackberry; there's also not a lot of room for photos there. The media cards are inexpensive and are available at most retailers who stock electronics (Radio Shack seems to always have a sale!).

So let's get started.

Start the camera on your blackberry. You should see a screen similar to this. (If your camera is set to full screen mode, press the 'sym' key and you'll see the controls at the bottom).

The trackball zooms (scroll up for zooming in, down for zooming out); the space bar toggles the flash mode (on/off/auto); the sym key toggles the full screen mode; take a photo by pressing the enter key, the track ball, or the right convenience key.

Once you've taken a photo, your screen will look like this (when you're not in full screen mode...remember, toggle with the sym key).

The icons along the bottom are:

• take another photo
• set picture as... (you can make it your home screen image or as a caller ID photo in your address book)
• rename the photo
• delete it
• send the photo

Click the last icon to the right and you'll see this menu (you might be able to scroll down in that menu if you have more sending choices such as Facebook).

If you select the email option, a new message will open with your photo as an attachment, as shown below:

Type in the recipient's address, scroll down to the body and add whatever you need there, and then send the email normally. If you chose Messenger, the photo will be sent via BBM (blackberry messenger) and if you chose MMS, you'll be prompted with an MMS message screen.

If you stay in full screen mode (I do because I can see the photo better), use the menu key to select how to send your photo. The menu looks like this:

Once you've sent the photograph, you'll be returned to the camera function where you can send it again to someone else, save it, etc.

Note: bbm and email tend to send fast; mms not so fast. It's a good idea to NOT delete your photo until you're sure it's really been sent (you can check the messaging window on your blackberry). If you take a picture, send it as an mms, and then go back to the camera and delete it, your blackberry may not have had enough time to send the photo and it will be lost.

So now grab your blackberry, take a photo and send it to someone!

Windows Screen Saver

Hi! When your PC has been idle for bit, your screen saver automatically kicks in. Today we'll look at the controls for your screen saver and how you can customize its settings to make you happy (yes...you can achieve true happiness through your screen saver settings!).

The screen saver is there to help prevent damage to your monitor by having one image on the screen for an uninterrupted long period of time. It's possible to burn the image into your screen, making your display look lousy. The screen saver is also a security feature, hiding your workspace and, if you configure it, requiring a password before allowing access back to the PC.

If the screen saver is on, you simply move your mouse or touch a key on the keyboard to turn it off.

The easiest way to get to the screen saver properties is to find an open space on your desktop and right-click with your mouse. Select and left click Properties from the menu; it's at the bottom. You'll see the Display Properties dialogue box. Click the Screen Saver tab (the middle one) and you'll see this:



In the middle of the box, you'll see the Screen Saver section where you can select the type of screen saver you want and, if available, choose the settings. You can also set the time your PC has to be idle before the screen saver kicks in and if you want to request a password upon leaving the screen saver.

Microsoft includes about a dozen screen savers with Windows. The one selected in the screen shot (Windows XP) has no custom settings; you can only tell it how long to wait before starting. Others have several options you can set such as speed, timing, text, color or sound, for example. You can test your settings by clicking the Preview button.

If your PC requires a password when you turn it on, checking the box On resume, display Welcome Screen will open the Welcome screen after the screen saver is stopped, asking for the password. That way, when you walk away from your PC and your screen saver kicks in, no one can jump on and see your work without the password.

Take a look at the different Screen Savers and their options; you might find one you like better than the one you're using now. And don't worry -- you can't break it! Experiment!

Are you happy now? I knew that you would be!

Screen Shots

Hi! Sometimes you'd like to show someone far away what your screen or active window looks like. For example, you can make some instructions for how to use a software program or you can send someone a screenshot of an error message so she can help you.

It's really easy to do, both on a PC and on a Mac.

I use screenshots all the time. This week, I needed to teach someone a new function in our scanning program. I took a series of screenshots of the program in action, pasted them into a Word document, and wrote instructions under each screenshot so the user could follow along.

Here's how to do screenshots. On a PC, you have a couple of choices:

1. press the PrtScn button to capture your entire screen and paste it to the clipboard. The PrtScn button is usually on the top row on the right side of your keyboard.
2. hold the alt key and, at the same time, press the PrtScn key to capture only the active window.

The screenshots are copied to the clipboard. That means you can use the paste command to put the screenshot into the program of your choice. I often use Word and Outlook as the destinations for my screenshots.

This function is also available on a Mac, of course. Here are the choices if you're a Mac user:

• Command-Shift-3: Take a screenshot of the screen, and save it as a file on the desktop
• Command-Shift-4, then select an area: Take a screenshot of an area and save it as a file on the desktop
• Command-Shift-4, then space, then click a window: Take a screenshot of a window and save it as a file on the desktop
• Command-Control-Shift-3: Take a screenshot of the screen, and save it to the clipboard
• Command-Control-Shift-4, then select an area: Take a screenshot of an area and save it to the clipboard
• Command-Control-Shift-4, then space, then click a window: Take a screenshot of a window and save it to the clipboard

A note about the clipboard: The clipboard is also called the paste buffer. When you copy something (like a screenshot), the operating system stores what you copied in the paste buffer. The clipboard remembers only the last thing you copied to it. So if you take a screen shot, then copy a line of text (using ctrl-c, for example), the clipboard will only have the line of text, not the screenshot. When you take a screenshot, paste it where you want it immediately so you don't lose it.

Just so you know, there are utilities -some free and some for cost- that give you more screenshot functions and power. The clipboard is free and, most of the time, will be all you need.

Enjoy!

Blackberry Date and Time

Hi. Here's a simple setting for your Blackberry to ensure that your date and time are always correct.

You can have your Blackberry set its date & time by the the blackberry network, your wireless network, or manually. I have mine set to take the time from the wireless network.

Here's how you get to the Date & Time settings: on your Blackberry, select Options, then scroll to and select Date/Time. You'll see the screen below (or something close to it, depending on your blackberry's operating system):




Scroll down to the Date/Time Source and click it; you'll have 3 choices. Once you've made your selection, press the menu key (the one to the left of the trackball) and you'll see the screen shot below:



Select Update Time and, if your phone needs it, you'll see the time change right before your eyes! You can press the menu key again and save or just press escape (the key to the right of the trackball). If appropriate, you'll be prompted to save your changes and you're all set!

When you do a reboot, it's a good idea to go to the Date/Time function in Options and update the time. That way, you know your blackberry is always accurate.

Have fun!

Blackberry Settings Quick Tip

Hi! Those of you with blackberrys, this one's for you!

Let's look at some settings that I've used to make my blackberry less annoying. Two things used to bother me:

1. the screen would become dim as I was using it, making the blackberry hard to use and
2. the green led would constantly flash, causing the phone to become obtrusive in dark places.

I want the screen to be bright until I'm ready to lock the phone and I never want to see that green flashing light. The green light means that your blackberry has a signal; my blackberry always has a signal so I don't need the indicator. Plus it's annoying!

By the way, the red light means that you have a message, and the blue light indicates that you're connected to ... wait for it ... a bluetooth device!

Luckily, we can deal with these things very easily! Here's what you do:

• on your blackberry, go to Options
• scroll to Screen/keyboard and select it
• scroll down in the list of settings until you see the Backlight Brightness setting. There's a screenshot of my blackberry below (yours might look different but the functions are the same).
  

To stop the automatic dimming, change the Automatically Dim Backlight setting to Off. As you can see above, my setting is off and my Backlight Brightness is set to 100%. Change these settings if you'd like to see what works best for you.

Look at the screen shot above; the LED Coverage Indicator is set to off. That turns off that green flashing light! My blackberry only flashes red when I have a message (email, sms, bbm, facebook, etc.); otherwise the LED is dark. That means that I can look at my phone and see that a message is waiting. No light, no message.

By the way, the blue flashing LED light is controlled in a different menu: go to Manage Connections, Bluetooth Options, choose the bluetooth device from the list, select Options, and turn LED Connection Indicator to off.

See? Simple and easy!

Using Colors with Your Outlook Mail

Hi! Like many of you, I get a lot of email in Outlook... a lot! When mail arrives from certain people, I've set it up so my Outlook colors those emails automatically for me so they stand out in the list of messages.

It's quick and easy to use colors to organize your emails -- here's how!

When you get an email from someone that you'd like to color (the email, not the person), click the message in your list so it's highlighted. Then use the Tools menu and select Organize. On the left hand side, you'll see Using Colors; click that. The top line on the right side allows you to color the messages from the sender of your highlighted email. Select the color you want and click Apply Color.

That's it! It's really that simple.

Just so you know, you can apply rules for sorting and moving emails to folders based on many conditions; you can see some of those choices by clicking Rules and Automatic Formatting.

For now, though, give coloring some email senders a try. I think it'll help you recognize those important mails when they come in.

Verizon Wireless *228 Programming

Hi! If you're a Verizon Wireless customer, this tip is important for you.

Verizon doesn't tell us to but we should be programming our phone on the network by dialing *228, pressing send, and selecting option 1. This is a free call and will give your phone the latest information it needs to work best on the Verizon network.

The information about your phone on Verizon's systems is very important in terms of how your phone works. It includes settings about your phone's roaming capabilities, access to the internet, text messaging and, if applicable, your email access. When you do the *228 programming, it loads Verizon's current specs into your phone quickly and easily.

So here's what you do:

1. go to your phone's telephone function.
2. dial *228
3. press send
   
4. the call will be answered by Verizon's automated system. Listen to the prompts.
5. select option 1 to program your phone.
6. you'll listen to some music while your device is programmed (the music is pretty annoying but the process is mercifully short).
7. you'll hear that the process is complete...you can hang up.

That's it! See? Simple!

How often should you do this? Verizon recommends every three months; I suggest you do it monthly! And if you have a blackberry and your email seems to be a little screwy, doing a battery pull and *228 might just well clear it up.

If you're a vzw customer, do a *228 programming now!

Blackberry Flashlight for Free!

Hi! Did you know that your blackberry has a built in flashlight that's free! Yep...tis true!

NOTE: for this tip to work, you need a media card in your blackberry. It's a little memory chip that lets you store photos, music, and docs-to-go files on it rather than in the blackberry's device memory. Having the card also allows you to record video with your blackberry. You can get a media card for your blackberry online and in Radio Shack, for example.

Ok... so if you have a media card, you'll love this tip!

Here's what you do:

1. turn on the blackberry camera
2. press the menu key (the blackberry logo to the left of the trackball)
3. select the video camera
4. when the round dot appears on the screen, indicating the video camera is on, press the space bar.

The flash over the camera lens will be on and will stay on until you press the space bar to turn it off or the video camera times out. This is a very bright light and is really useful for reading menus in restaurants, guiding you in the dark, and finding things when you're in dimly lit rooms.

I know some people who use the backlight from the screen to shed some light. After you see the video camera light, you'll agree that it's the best light to use.

So give it a try!

Portable Battery Power

Hi! Has it happened to you? Your mobile phone, audio player (MP3, iPod), gaming device, GPS, Digital Camera, or other gadget runs low on battery power and you don't have your charger to keep it going when you need it most. It's happened to me with my blackberry and I hate that...so I looked around and found a cool way to deal with it!

I found a small, inexpensive, portable and reliable way to keep emergency power for my blackberry and my ipod. It's the powerXtender charger from igo.com.

According to iGo's website, the powerXtender can give you up to 10 hours of talking, 20 hours of playing or 28 hours of listening. It provides emergency power for your mobile devices anywhere you go, uses 2 AA batteries (included) and iGo power tips to charge your mobile devices.

The powerXtender fits in the palm of your hand and comes with one free power tip. The power tips are unique to each device: I have one for my blackberry and one for my ipod.

There's a little switch on the side of the powerXtender. I turn on the switch, make sure the correct power tip is on the device, and plug it into the charging port of my device. That's all there is to it. And it works great!

I love that it uses AA batteries because I can get those anywhere in the world. I have the powerXtender in the console of my car and put it in my travel bag when I go away. I have a car charger for my blackberry but if I'm away from my car and using my bb a lot, I can be in trouble. The powerXtender has made the difference more times than I can remember.

I got mine at Radio Shack but you can get it from the iGo website for about $20 delivered. Check out the iGo website here.

Pretty cool, I think.