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9 Tips To Keep Windows XP Running Smooth

There are many things that cause a computer to be sluggish from software to hardware. It can be too small a hard drive or not enough RAM. It can be anything from BIOS and/or Operating System Settings to programs that are eating up your CPU and RAM (no matter how much you have). Or it can be your network.

Personally, I work my computer like a young mother with a house full of kids 12 to 18 hours a day.

That mother needs to unwind at the end of the day and so does my computer and probably yours too.

Here are 9 Tips in the order they should be completed that can help keep your computer happy and working without complaining:

1. This is so basic I shouldn’t need to say it, Keep Which Ever E-Mail Program You Use Cleaned Out. I have clients who are always complaining, but who refuse to dump years and years of accumulated e-mail.

2. Make sure you have a good anti virus program (Only one per computer please), have it up to date, and auto monitoring.

3. Make sure you have a good anti spy ware program (Only one per computer), have it up to date, and auto monitoring.

4. Run Disk Clean Up Daily (Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Disk Clean Up – a box opens – make sure each box is checked, click ‘OK’ – a box pops up – Click Yes).

5. Delete Cookies and Cached Files Daily (Start, Control Panel -if you have not done it yet, click ‘Switch To Classic View’, Internet Options – a pop up box will appear – Delete Cookies, Click OK, Click Delete Files – check ‘Delete All Offline Content’ – Click OK, Now Set Your Clear History to no more than 7 Days – if you haven’t used it for a week you probably won’t miss it – Click OK)

6. A very important step almost everyone misses: Empty The Prefetch Folder (Start, My Computer, ‘C’ , Windows, Prefetch Folder, Edit, Select All, File, Delete – pop up box appears – Click Yes, Close Windows Window)

7. Empty Recycle Bin. For the sake of brevity, I am assuming everyone knows where it is and how to empty it.

8. Scan Hard Drive ‘C’ (Start, My Computer, Right Click ‘C’ – box opens – Click Properties at the bottom – another box opens – Click Tools, Click Check Now, Make sure both ‘Automatically fix file system errors’ and ‘Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors’ are checked, Click Start. Get a cup of java (oh, black, thank you) and Wait !

9. Defrag Computer (Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Disk Defragmenter – window opens – Select ‘C’ Drive, Click Defragment). Pop a top and Wait !

The last two steps (8 and 9) can take awhile if they have not been done recently. I complete this entire routine on my computer just before I stop work for the day everyday and the entire sequence takes no longer than 20 minutes and often much less.

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As a business owner or manager, the decision to opt for offshore software development can be difficult. As anyone who has experience knows, there are advantages and disadvantages to outsourcing software development. How then, do you balance the risks and rewards and come out on top? Here are five tips to ensure that you receive an excellent return on investment:

1. Complex project management experience. When selecting an offshore software development company, ensure that they have extensive experience in complex project management. The company’s internal team should run like a well-oiled machine, and they should have longstanding relationships with their own subcontractors.

2. Specialized knowledge and expertise. The most agile software development companies have an extensive network of specialists. These specialists may not be on the company payroll (which is why the company can offer you significant cost savings), but they can be depended upon to complete the necessary tasks on time and within the budget.

3. Knowledge of your industry. In theory, offshore software development companies should be able to perform custom software development for any type of business. There will be less of a learning curve, though, and greater chances for success, if the company has knowledge of your industry or a related industry. For this reason, ask for referrals and determine if the projects the company has managed are similar to or in alignment with the goals of your project.

4. Delineate areas of responsibility. Chances are, you’re considering hiring an offshore software development company because you don’t have the in-house expertise to get the job done and know that it is more cost-effective to outsource the project. Nonetheless, you will need to actively participate in a needs assessment and at various benchmarks throughout the life of the project. By creating a clear delineation of areas of responsibility, you will have a clear understanding of the number of staff hours you need to devote to the project, and plan accordingly.

5. High standards. Both you and the offshore software development company you choose should adhere to high standards. Aside from the talent of the technical experts involved, successful custom software development depends upon rigorous testing. The most dependable companies use the highest industry standards in testing each aspect of the products they create so that you receive a product that is ready to implement.

Essentially, the most successful offshore software development companies are competent and flexible, and see their role as an information technology partner who solves your software problems, supports your team, and manages your projects from beginning to end. When you choose such a company, you can rest assured that you will receive an excellent return on investment.

Microsoft Word is an extremely easy tool to start using. However there are lots of interesting features “under the bonnet”. Some of these features can save you a lot of time when producing documents. I am amazed that they are not as well known as they should be. These top seven tips are my favourites and I cannot imagine life with Microsoft Word before I found them!

1.    Oops. I left Caps lock on!

We all know that feeling. You are typing away merrily and then you look up at your screen to realise that you had hit the Caps Lock button. Now everything you just typed is in the wrong capitalisation. Don’t despair. Highlight the text and goto the Format menu and select Change Case from the drop down menu. Then just select your desired case from the list provided, which will probably be tOGGLE cASE.

2.    While we are talking Cases.

Some useful shortcut keys:

Highlight your text and click Control Shift A to set it all to Upper Case.

Control Shift K will set it to Small capitals.

3.    Moving quickly around your document.

Try these shortcuts to get around your document quickly.

Control Alt Page Down: Next Page
Control Alt Page Up: Previous Page
Control Home: Go to the top of your document
Control Alt End: Go to the end of your document

Also, with later versions of Word there is a clever little button beneath the vertical scroll bar called the Select Browse Object. Click on this and select one of its options to browse through your document going straight to the next table, graphic, heading etc.

4.    I’m lost. Where was I?

Forgot where you just made a change in your document? Try pressing Shift + F5.
This will take you back to the last place you made a change. You can do this two more times to go back to the two previous changes.

5.    One click find

One of the annoyances of the Find screen when you are looking for occurrence of text in your document is the fact that it always seems to appear right over the text your are looking for! However there is no need to keep the screen open. Once you have used the Find command to find the first entry, close the Find screen. You should notice that the small double arrows below the vertical scroll bar on the right of Word have changed to blue. Click on these to go up and down your document finding your text.

6.    Numbering the rows in your tables

How many times have you created a table where you just want the first column to be a numbered list. It’s easy to do this quickly. Simply select the column and click on the Numbering button on your Word toolbar. The same thing works if you select a row and want to have numbering across your columns

7.    Fast Page breaks

My final tip is really simple and is probably the one I use the most. To insert a page break quickly, simply use CTRL + Enter