Have you ever had to wait on hold for a long time? Have you ever gotten bored? Even those of us who provide tech support have to wait on hold for tech support sometimes. Or the cable company. Or the phone company. This week: three websites to help you pass the time on hold.

Play Breakout with Google Images

Hello, fellow Boomers! Remember when “video games” were enormous tables in the bar and you had to keep feeding in quarters? (You younger folks just need to stand by for a minute while the rest of us listen to “Night Moves.”) Atari Breakout was one of those quarter-sucking games.

Good news! You can play it on your computer for free, and there’s a twist. The blocks are Google Image search results. Just go to Google Images at http://images.google.ca/ (or http://images.google.com/ for my American readers) and type Atari Breakout into the search box. Click on the blue magnifying glass icon or press the Enter key on your keyboard to start playing. Use your mouse or the arrow keys on your keyboard to move the paddle.

Good luck. The reason this column is late getting to Castanet is because of all the “research” I did on this game. (That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.)

Explore the world with GeoGuessr

That’s not a typo, it’s a cute internet spelling. Leaving that aside, GeoGuessr shows you a Google Street View of … somewhere. Look at the picture, click on the map to indicate where you think you are, and see your score. Some places are easier to guess than others. Start playing here: http://geoguessr.com/.

You Had One Job…

A slide show of things done wrong. Point your browser here: http://hadonejob.com/ and click the arrows at the bottom of the screen to move through the slides. Or, click the arrow farthest to the left let the slides advance on their own.

Be careful not to be laughing hysterically when whoever you’re holding for comes on the line. This site is not recommended for viewing during important conference calls.

Photo: Contributed

Never wait on hold again

“Never” would be overstating it. But in the US and here in Canada, LucyPhone will call you back when your tech support or credit card or telephone company agent actually comes on the line. It’s easy and it’s free. But it’s so efficient that it might cut into your “On Hold” game routine!

Do you need help with your computer? I'm here to help you and your home or business computer get along!

Cate Eales runs Computer Care Kelowna (http://computercarekelowna.com/) a mobile service helping home users and businesses get along with their computers. To arrange an appointment phone her at 250-764-7043. Cate also welcomes your comments and suggestions. Send email to help@computercarekelowna.com.

You can read previous columns here: http://rlis.com/column.htm . If you'd like to subscribe to this column by email, please visit this link: http://www.feedblitz.com/f/f.fbz?Sub=20618 . It's easy, and free. If you'd prefer the RSS Feed, click here: http://rlis.com/rlis.xml.

Add-ons, plugins and extensions. Browsers and search engines. Are these things the same? Should we accept the updates when they’re offered?

Add-ons, plugins, extensions

Faithful reader “Norm” wrote that he is confused about add-ons, plugins, and extensions. Are they the same thing? Should we be updating all of them?

To put this as succinctly as possible, browser plugins and add-ons are both extensions, but different kinds of extensions. Plugins generally are parts of other programs that “plug in” to the browser. Examples are Java, FlashPlayer, and Silverlight. Plugins are typically installed by other programs on your computer. Extensions are generally part of the browser that “extend” the browser’s basic functionality. Examples include Web of Trust, Foxclocks, and toolbars like Google or Yahoo! toolbars. It’s the user who installs extensions into the browser, sometimes unknowingly.

Should you update? Yes, you should! Updates are issued for performance improvements and for security reasons. If you find that you aren’t using an add-on any more, you should uninstall it. If you’re using an extension, you should keep it up to date.

Browsers, search engines

Many people are confused about browsers and search engines. A good percentage of those people don’t even realize they’re confused. That’s fine until you need help with something and don’t know what to ask for help with.

A browser is a program on your computer that allows you to visit places on the World Wide Web, called websites. It is not a search engine, although you use your web browser to go to search engines like Google or Yahoo! or Bing. Stay with me; I’m going to untangle this. I promise.

Internet Explorer is a browser made by Microsoft. It comes installed on Windows computers. If you’ve ever clicked on the lower case blue “e” with the gold line through it, you’ve used Internet Explorer.

The Firefox browser from Mozilla is a good alternative to Internet Explorer. It is safer and generally faster than IE. You might recognize the orange fox wrapped around the blue earth Firefox icon. You can download Firefox here: http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/. I like Firefox a lot. I’ve been using it for years, and I highly recommend it. There are tons of extensions for it!

Chrome, from Google, is the new kid on the browser block. It’s fast and it has add-ons, like Firefox. You can download it here: http://www.google.com/chrome. There are other browsers as well, notably Safari from Apple (but it will run on Windows): http://www.apple.com/safari/ and Opera: http://www.opera.com/.

Each of these browsers is a little different, but the thing they all have in common is that they exist for the purpose of guiding you through the World Wide Web. For the best brief explanation of this I have ever seen, visit this page (in your browser!) from Common Craft: http://www.commoncraft.com/video/web-browsers. Get to know your browser; it’s one of the most important programs on your computer. And yes, you need to keep it up to date!

A search engine is a site on the World Wide Web that finds and organizes information for you, based on what you tell it you’re looking for. You get there using --- wait for it --- a browser!

Well known search engines are Google, Bing, and Yahoo! but there are many others. If you want to find the answer to a question, or you want to find some websites about a particular topic, you open up your browser and you use a search engine to find what you’re looking for. Any search engine is just a place on the Web, and you get there with your browser.

So a search engine and a browser aren’t the same thing. A car and a map aren’t the same thing, either. Your browser is like a car, transporting you to your destination. A search engine is the map you need to find your way.

Photo: Contributed

Do you need help with your computer? I'm here to help you and your home or business computer get along!

Cate Eales runs Computer Care Kelowna (http://computercarekelowna.com/) a mobile service helping home users and businesses get along with their computers. To arrange an appointment phone her at 250-764-7043. Cate also welcomes your comments and suggestions. Send email to help@computercarekelowna.com.

You can read previous columns here: http://rlis.com/column.htm . If you'd like to subscribe to this column by email, please visit this link: http://www.feedblitz.com/f/f.fbz?Sub=20618 . It's easy, and free. If you'd prefer the RSS Feed, click here: http://rlis.com/rlis.xml.

When it comes to Windows --- any version of Windows --- some of the built-in “features” make me feel downright curmudgeonly. Here’s how to turn off a pair of the most annoying things Windows does.

Disable Snap

Microsoft introduced Snap in Windows 7 and carried over to Windows 8. When you drag an open window to the side of the screen, Snap thinks you want to dock it there and make it take up half the screen. When you drag a window to the top of the screen, it suddenly takes up the entire screen.

Some people think this is a neat feature. Others just want to know how to turn it off. It’s easy to do once you know how.

In Windows 7:

• Click on Start | Control Panel
• In the Search box at the top of the Control Panel window, start typing ease of access
• Click on Ease of Access Center | Make the keyboard easier…
• Scroll down to Explore all settings
• Click on Make the mouse easier…
• Place a check mark in the box that says Prevent Windows from being automatically arranged when moved to the edge of the screen
• OK your way out.

In Widows 8:

• Right-click on a blank area on the Start Screen
• A menu bar appears at the bottom of the screen. Click on All apps
• Click on Control Panel (It’s in the Accessories area, for some reason)
• Click on Ease of Access | Ease of Access Center
• Make the mouse easier to use
• Scroll down and place a check mark in the box that says Prevent Windows from being automatically arranged when moved to the edge of the screen
• OK your way out

That will stop that unwanted docking and exploding behaviour.

Bypass the Windows 8 Lock Screen

A lock screen is a pretty good idea on a smart phone. It’s not a terrible idea on a tablet. If you have a smart phone or a tablet, you’re used to swiping the lock screen away to get to the real stuff. In my opinion, a lock screen is completely useless on a PC.

When Windows 8 boots up, you have to swipe (if you have a touch screen PC), click on the lock screen, or tap the Escape key just to get to the sign in screen. If you want to eliminate that annoyance and go straight to the sign in, you can do it either by editing the Registry or by downloading and merging a Registry key from the excellent HowToGeek website, here: http://www.howtogeek.com/134620/how-to-disable-the-lock-screen-on-windows-8-without-using-group-policy/.

You will find full instructions there, and full instructions to undo your edits, should you need to.

Photo: Contributed

WARNING: If you don’t know what you’re doing, please do not monkey around with the Registry. Bad things can happen. The DisableLockScreen zip file on that site is safe if you follow the instructions.

If you have the Professional or Enterprise version of Windows 8, you can use Group Policy Editor to disable the lock screen. Those instructions are here: http://www.howtogeek.com/110283/how-to-disable-the-lock-screen-in-windows-8/. Windows Home Premium does not include the Group Policy Editor.
 

Do you have a tweak you want to share? Send email to help@computercarekelowna.com and I’ll pass along the good ones in future columns.

Do you need help with your computer? I'm here to help you and your home or business computer get along!

Cate Eales runs Computer Care Kelowna (http://computercarekelowna.com/) a mobile service helping home users and businesses get along with their computers. To arrange an appointment phone her at 250-764-7043. Cate also welcomes your comments and suggestions. Send email to help@computercarekelowna.com.

You can read previous columns here: http://rlis.com/column.htm . If you'd like to subscribe to this column by email, please visit this link: http://www.feedblitz.com/f/f.fbz?Sub=20618 . It's easy, and free. If you'd prefer the RSS Feed, click here: http://rlis.com/rlis.

This week’s column answers three questions that have come up in the last couple of weeks. Learn how to find out if a website is safe, spot a hoax, and open more than one Explorer window at a time.

How do I know if a website is safe?

Photo: Contributed

After I clean out a computer, often a customer will ask me, “How can I keep this from happening again?” I’ve written many times about safe browsing, most recently here: http://rlis.com/columns/column400.htm. Add-ons like Web of Trust (http://mywot.com/), and the security plug-in that’s built into Avast! Antivirus are good for checking search results. But what if you want more information about a site that WOT and Avast! don’t rate?

There are several good websites where you can enter a URL and get a reputation score. One is the Google Advisory website. It will tell you whether it thinks the site you ask about is safe, whether it’s been hosting malicious software recently, and more. The downside? You have to type http://www.google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?site= and the URL every time you want to query it. Most of us can’t be bothered with that on a regular basis.

Here’s an easy way to check a website’s reputation: Visit the Online Link Scan website, here: http://onlinelinkscan.com/. Type the URL of the website you want to check in the search box, and click to scan. In a moment, you’ll see results for that site from five reputation checking site, including the Google Advisory site, PhishTank and SpyEyeTracker.

You’ll also see ads for things that will take you away from the Online Link Scan site. Be cautious. I wish people wouldn’t put ads there, but everyone has to make a living somehow, and the service is ad-supported (which is different than “free”).

How do I know if something is a hoax?

I have a very good friend who is on a mission to make sure all her Facebook friends know who to find out whether something is a hoax or not. As she would point out, it only takes two minutes to check before you Share, Post, or Forward. Good resources are Snopes (http://snopes.com/), Hoax Slayer (http://www.hoax-slayer.com/), and just using Google to search on something followed by the word “hoax.” If I had done that, I wouldn’t have been taken in by the “Eagle Steals Canadian Baby” YouTube video hoax. You can see the video here: http://youtu.be/WxtNixNGf4k. (It includes a cuss word…twice.) Searching Google for “eagle steals baby hoax” would have made me feel less foolish: http://bit.ly/17YhAbE.

How can I see the files on my flash drive and the files in Documents at the same time?

You need to open two Explorer windows at the same time. (Not Internet Explorer, just the File Explorer that’s built into Windows.) To do that:

• Open your Documents as you normally would
• Hold down the Ctrl and the N key simultaneously. That tells Windows to open a new Window. Navigate to your flash drive, and you’re good to go.

Another way it to press the key with the Windows logo/flag on it and the E key at the same time. That opens up another Explorer window. Again, navigate to the folder you want, and you can drag and drop files between the open windows.

Do you need help with your computer? I'm here to help you and your home or business computer get along!

Cate Eales runs Computer Care Kelowna (http://computercarekelowna.com/) a mobile service helping home users and businesses get along with their computers. To arrange an appointment phone her at 250-764-7043. Cate also welcomes your comments and suggestions. Send email to help@computercarekelowna.com.

You can read previous columns here: http://rlis.com/column.htm . If you'd like to subscribe to this column by email, please visit this link: http://www.feedblitz.com/f/f.fbz?Sub=20618 . It's easy, and free. If you'd prefer the RSS Feed, click here: http://rlis.com/rlis.xml.