Category Archives: User Groups

Posts related computer user groups.

Freeware – tinySpell

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This is a follow up to the September 21, 2006 post Blog – Lifehacker, after which I have tried out the tinySpell “Download of the Day”.

This little application has been a real help to me when using Notepad or NoteTab Light to draft my blog postings emails and drafts for newsletter articles.

There are two versions tinySpell and tinySpell+, the first being freeware and the second an enhanced version, which will remember the last error, let you added auto-replacements and lists of words to the dictionary, checks capitalization, ignores internet and email addresses, etc.

I have been using the freeware version.

I have turned off the beep notification, and just rely on the tinySpell icon in the system tray to turn yellow and catch my eye.

When the icon turns yellow, I just left click on it and it comes up with a list of suggested corrections, from which I can choose or be allowed to add the word in question to the tinySpell dictionary.

I have been impressed with this little application and recommend it to others as an option for those applications that do not have their on spell checking capabilities. Also, I have seen no conflicts with the spell checkers in Microsoft Word, Publisher and OpenOffice Writer.

The link for the version I have used and written about above is http://tinyspell.m6.net/. There are links to several reviews there as well.

Try it out for yourself and let me know what you think.

If you have some other helpful application and you think I should check it out, leave me a comment with all the particulars and maybe one day there will be a posting about it.

NoteTab Light

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I was unable to access the internet while I was on vacation June 6th and 8th, so this post will be a little longer than most.

I have been using NotePad Light, a free Windows Notepad replacement, for a little while now. I like it because it enables me to create my blog posts in HTML, by using the included library of HTML codings.

The version I am using is the freeware NoteTab Light 4.95,available at http://www.notetab.com. NoteTab Standard and NoteTab Pro are also available at the ame site.

Though most people think that a Notepad replacement would be as relatively simple as what it is replacing, that is definitely not the case. NoteTab is much more than just another plain text editor. NoteTab has all the following and more:

  • Open and edit many documents at once, even huge files (only limited by system resources.
  • Text drag-and-drop editing.
  • AutoCorrect/Auto-replace mode similar to Microsoft® WinWord.
  • Programmable. Add your own custom features using an easy script language.
  • Web enabled: can open links and HTML documents in browser.
  • Supports third-party Web tools: HTML Tidy, TopStyle, and CSE HTML Validator.
  • Each document can have different settings such as font, tab widths, word wrap.
  • Supports outline-type documents
    that help you organize your notes or any kind of information.
  • Supports document templates.
  • Covers all essential features available in Notepad (including LOG).

I particularly like the ability to have multiple documents open in a tabbed interface, similar to the way I work in my Firefox browser. I can have a text only document in one tab from which I am copying information, an outline document in another tab to keep everything in a logical order, and be creating an HTML version in another tab, all at the same time. This results in a much more efficient use of my time and keeps me orderly in the way I work from print to desktop publishing to web page development; I just keep my basic formatting consistent by only utilizing 3 sets of headings, an unordered list, an ordered list, and very basic body text setup.

I currently take the plain text into one of my full fledged word processors for spell check but, in the future plan to see if I can find a freeware or open source spell checker for use with NoteTab to eliminate the crossing back and forth. One of the third party products recommended with the installation of NoteTab is WordWeb but, I can not tell from what they show if it can be used for spell check or, just as a thesaurus.

I can take a plain text file and convert it to HTML easily using the options under the Modify menu in NoteTab as well as stripping the HTML tags if necessary from an HTML email for example; both of these come in quite handy for the various formats I receive information for the Newsletter.

There is a lot more functionality available within NoteTab. As I become more familiar with specific functions, I will post my thoughts on them here.

On a personal note, my hurricane shutters were installed today. We feel a lot better now about this year’s hurricane season and being prepared but, hope that they won’t be needed.

 

C:BPCA News and Recovering Missing Toolbars

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First of all the May 2006 edition of C:BPCA News has been sent out.

It is also available in PDF format at http://snipurl.com/BPCA_News (Note: link no longer valid)

Hurricane Wilma

Secondly, as I was writing this entry, the man from the shutter company arrived to make the final measurements for the hurricane shutters I have ordered.

The day of Hurricane Wilma is when they were first supposed to come out and give me an estimate. Of course, that did not happen. It was November before they could take the initial measurements and then it took until late December to get the architectural approval from the condo association.

Luckily, the price has stayed the same, but with the shortage of materials and labor, the last time I talked to the company they thought we were looking at sometime in the late fall for installation.

Hopefully, with the final measurements now taken so that they can be manufactured, my shutters can be installed prior or right at the beginning of this year’s hurricane season. Hurray!!!!

Tip

Lastly, my wife called me all in a panic yesterday because she could not see the toolbar in Outlook that has the icons for creating a new message, printing a message, etc.

She thought she had totally messed up the company computer.

I calmed her down and told her it is not a big deal, she must have just slipped with the mouse and turned off the toolbar.

Sure enough, I told her to look at the menu bar, find where it says View, left click on it, then left click on Toolbars, and then make sure that the Standard toolbar has a check next to it. Mission accomplished.

In most cases, if a toolbar is missing, visiting the View menu and experimenting with turning various toolbars on and off should recover it for you. You might even run across a useful toolbar you didn’t even know existed because it wasn’t turned on by default.

Most of the newer software has a lot of optional toolbars, that can be helpful, once you know about them.