I have an email account that I forget about, now that I've got my new computer and don't have my old reliable email program anymore. It wouldn't work on Windows 7.
The email account is one that gets messages from various thing I signed up for over the years, but by and large it's been captured by spam people. So it's actually worthless.
I have another program that can check on it and delete things without actually downloading them. And tonight I'm finding out how truly good it is. I thought I had to download the headers at least for everything. But that was taking longer than I like. So I checked the options at the top, and, thankfully, there actually is an option for deleting all messages on the server.
"This cannot be undone," it warned, in words similar to that. "OK," I reply, "so much the better." Delete the garbage!
It's going maybe 10-15 every second or so, so that's not as fast as I'd like but still pretty fast. It's about halfway done. And I would guess I need to stay connected for it to continue. It'd be nice if it just kept going on its own but I'm not going to take that chance.
Showing posts with label computers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label computers. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Saturday, January 9, 2010
I Did A Bunch Of Scanning Today
I got a new scanner a week ago.
I'm still using it quite a bit, with a lot of experimentation on settings and saving files to try and get exactly what I want, both to preserve documents, records, and to do it reasonably efficiently.
The interfaces for it are many, since each application has it's own little ability to get a scan.
The one I was using today, with pretty good success, was OmniPage Professional 16. Once I got the settings right. For a while I was scanning handwritten stuff and it kept flipping the documents, upside down, sideways, etc. So after doing a whole notebook, I checked the settings and there's a way of turning that off. But you want it on for lots of things, so it will just automatically right things. Which it does effectively when it comes to printed words.
Then I was experimenting with the PDF settings. I'd never made a PDF before where you could highlight the words and copy them if you wanted. (I guess I made one nearly a week ago, but a bad one with the crummy scanner interface that came with the scanner -- Lexmark.) You'd almost think that a scanner company would want the greatest software to go out with their equipment instead of some dimwitted crap like you get. But that's beside the point.
The OmniPage will probably be my scanner interface of choice. I got VueScan, which is great in many ways, but somehow it doesn't detect the Automatic Document Feeder reliably. The OmniPage never failed once.
Once things are scanned (and in some cases a PDF file is made of a collection) the originals I shred or throw away. Eventually I'll be down to two pieces of paper in the house: my birth certificate and of course toilet paper. You wouldn't want to wipe with a PDF!
I'm still using it quite a bit, with a lot of experimentation on settings and saving files to try and get exactly what I want, both to preserve documents, records, and to do it reasonably efficiently.
The interfaces for it are many, since each application has it's own little ability to get a scan.
The one I was using today, with pretty good success, was OmniPage Professional 16. Once I got the settings right. For a while I was scanning handwritten stuff and it kept flipping the documents, upside down, sideways, etc. So after doing a whole notebook, I checked the settings and there's a way of turning that off. But you want it on for lots of things, so it will just automatically right things. Which it does effectively when it comes to printed words.
Then I was experimenting with the PDF settings. I'd never made a PDF before where you could highlight the words and copy them if you wanted. (I guess I made one nearly a week ago, but a bad one with the crummy scanner interface that came with the scanner -- Lexmark.) You'd almost think that a scanner company would want the greatest software to go out with their equipment instead of some dimwitted crap like you get. But that's beside the point.
The OmniPage will probably be my scanner interface of choice. I got VueScan, which is great in many ways, but somehow it doesn't detect the Automatic Document Feeder reliably. The OmniPage never failed once.
Once things are scanned (and in some cases a PDF file is made of a collection) the originals I shred or throw away. Eventually I'll be down to two pieces of paper in the house: my birth certificate and of course toilet paper. You wouldn't want to wipe with a PDF!
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Rearranging My Room
Since I got a new computer a couple days ago, that meant everything had to shift. In the room.
My old computer, I'm still going to need for various things. But it needed to go somewhere besides on this one desk, because this particular desk is more the right height for the new computer. Since it's a laptop, the keyboard is clear up here somewhere, with this big section at the bottom. To type on it with any quickness I need to hit it at a particular angle, and even then it's kind of annoying.
But already I've doubled my typing speed just by changing the height of the keyboard.
To get to this position means shifting, as I said. But shifting of computers that have been in place for years is not an easy task. Plus there was lots of other junk stacked up all over the desk, including old candy papers, and even some candy! There was one piece of melted candy stuck to my desk, and about an inch of dust all over everything. What a mess. Lots of scraps of paper, crap from ages ago.
Then there's the whole matter of cords, tangled up, hooked up around other things, like spaghetti. To do this is an enormous commitment. But it won't do it by itself. So I got it going, scooping off everything into a big basket. I found a couple CDs I hadn't seen for a couple years. I wondered where they went!
The very last thing, the desk is a little uneven, apparently, because I had to put a quarter under one corner of the computer to keep it stable. I'll have to come up with a more permanent thing there. A piece of cardboard taped down probably. Or part of a CD case. I don't know.
My old computer, I'm still going to need for various things. But it needed to go somewhere besides on this one desk, because this particular desk is more the right height for the new computer. Since it's a laptop, the keyboard is clear up here somewhere, with this big section at the bottom. To type on it with any quickness I need to hit it at a particular angle, and even then it's kind of annoying.
But already I've doubled my typing speed just by changing the height of the keyboard.
To get to this position means shifting, as I said. But shifting of computers that have been in place for years is not an easy task. Plus there was lots of other junk stacked up all over the desk, including old candy papers, and even some candy! There was one piece of melted candy stuck to my desk, and about an inch of dust all over everything. What a mess. Lots of scraps of paper, crap from ages ago.
Then there's the whole matter of cords, tangled up, hooked up around other things, like spaghetti. To do this is an enormous commitment. But it won't do it by itself. So I got it going, scooping off everything into a big basket. I found a couple CDs I hadn't seen for a couple years. I wondered where they went!
The very last thing, the desk is a little uneven, apparently, because I had to put a quarter under one corner of the computer to keep it stable. I'll have to come up with a more permanent thing there. A piece of cardboard taped down probably. Or part of a CD case. I don't know.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Defragging My Computer
I have two computers that I use. And both of them are slow as molasses.
They're old and don't have enough memory, etc., but at times they've worked along fairly well. Nothing like what I've seen lately in decreased performance. Like sludge.
One of them says it doesn't need to be defragged but the other did. So I'm letting it go doing that now. It's taking forever, and the hard drive is a really small one.
I also deleted all the TEMP files, which was a challenge in and of itself, since the disk cleanup function didn't work properly till I looked it up and made a registry change. Crazy crap.
The other computer -- which is very sluggish -- I ran a spyware thing. It came up with 48 minor, really nothing sorts of things. I don't know if any were serious, but I haven't seen anything especially wrong on that front.
Tomorrow I'll see if it's any faster.
I seriously need two brand new computers. The time is practically here, now with the new Windows 7 being released.
They're old and don't have enough memory, etc., but at times they've worked along fairly well. Nothing like what I've seen lately in decreased performance. Like sludge.
One of them says it doesn't need to be defragged but the other did. So I'm letting it go doing that now. It's taking forever, and the hard drive is a really small one.
I also deleted all the TEMP files, which was a challenge in and of itself, since the disk cleanup function didn't work properly till I looked it up and made a registry change. Crazy crap.
The other computer -- which is very sluggish -- I ran a spyware thing. It came up with 48 minor, really nothing sorts of things. I don't know if any were serious, but I haven't seen anything especially wrong on that front.
Tomorrow I'll see if it's any faster.
I seriously need two brand new computers. The time is practically here, now with the new Windows 7 being released.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Computer Memory Dreams
Coincidental today to buying a 1 T external hard drive to add to my fleet of three other (lesser) externals, I found something I wrote on February 16, 1984. I just want to quote a little bit of it. The computer I had then was either a VIC-20 or a Commodore 64. I mention storing programs on both cassette or on a disc drive. I know my VIC-20 used a cassette system, but when I had the 64, at some point, I also had a disc drive. Anyway, I don't remember which I had at the time.
Everything below this paragraph is from my 1984 article:
Home technology. Computers and the like. Where'd they come from? What are they for? Where are they going? Are they indispensable?
[BIG SNIP]
We who keep up on computers are told that memory constraints will one day be a thing of the past. We'll have millions of bytes to store our programs in. So what will we have stored in them? Longer versions of what I described above [games, educational programs]. Encyclopedia articles.
Will one have to sit and wait for a cassette to load for 45 minutes before using one of these massive programs? Or with a disc drive... will we need a separate disc to store each of these programs? The possibilities seem nauseating at this stage, and often I think we're chugging along toward them just because we're told how wonderful they will be.
Are we continuously to be updating our equipment to employ every new advance from the manufacturers. It's a matter of choice, of course. The hobbyist who digs it can buy what she or he affords and assumes they need. The family who knows little of what's going on and never finds uses for the computer that jibe with their original expectations may drop out. New families will take their place along the corridor of time. They'll open the door like their predecessor, step out momentarily and go back inside.
[I said word processing was probably the nicest function of homer computers. I wrote about the downside of storing articles on computer discs because they can be easily destroyed. Paper is more permanent.]
As I wrote that the tv screen blinked (as there's a flaw in this guy's program or in the computer itself) and I thought that perhaps my thoughts here would disappear.
[OK...that's the end of what I'm going to type from 1984].
2009 -- Now I think for sure this is when I had the Commodore 64. When I mentioned "this guy's program," that refers to a word processing program that I typed out of a computer magazine, line by line with checksum numbers. I can't think what it was called but it was a helpful program at the time. I myself had made a word processing program in BASIC, but the lines were simply arrays, so there could be no editing of, say, a paragraph without shifting each line. So it was not real useful.
Everything below this paragraph is from my 1984 article:
Home technology. Computers and the like. Where'd they come from? What are they for? Where are they going? Are they indispensable?
[BIG SNIP]
We who keep up on computers are told that memory constraints will one day be a thing of the past. We'll have millions of bytes to store our programs in. So what will we have stored in them? Longer versions of what I described above [games, educational programs]. Encyclopedia articles.
Will one have to sit and wait for a cassette to load for 45 minutes before using one of these massive programs? Or with a disc drive... will we need a separate disc to store each of these programs? The possibilities seem nauseating at this stage, and often I think we're chugging along toward them just because we're told how wonderful they will be.
Are we continuously to be updating our equipment to employ every new advance from the manufacturers. It's a matter of choice, of course. The hobbyist who digs it can buy what she or he affords and assumes they need. The family who knows little of what's going on and never finds uses for the computer that jibe with their original expectations may drop out. New families will take their place along the corridor of time. They'll open the door like their predecessor, step out momentarily and go back inside.
[I said word processing was probably the nicest function of homer computers. I wrote about the downside of storing articles on computer discs because they can be easily destroyed. Paper is more permanent.]
As I wrote that the tv screen blinked (as there's a flaw in this guy's program or in the computer itself) and I thought that perhaps my thoughts here would disappear.
[OK...that's the end of what I'm going to type from 1984].
2009 -- Now I think for sure this is when I had the Commodore 64. When I mentioned "this guy's program," that refers to a word processing program that I typed out of a computer magazine, line by line with checksum numbers. I can't think what it was called but it was a helpful program at the time. I myself had made a word processing program in BASIC, but the lines were simply arrays, so there could be no editing of, say, a paragraph without shifting each line. So it was not real useful.
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