You can do IT in later life

You can do IT is a regular feature of laterlife.com aimed at trying to help laterlife visitors make the most of Information Technology on or off the web. 

Jackie Sherman who runs the You can do IT Question & Answer section is an IT trainer and author. Jackie has spent her career in education and specialises in teaching IT to adults. Her courses for adults include such topics as MS Office, the Internet, e-mail and basic web page authoring.  

Jackie has also written several books - you can find more details about these by clicking here. Jackie has also been running a course specifically for over 50s.

Via laterlife.com Jackie aims to particularly help those new to IT and the web to build up knowledge and confidence, so no question is too basic. At the same time she will cover Q&As for the more experienced user. 

So if you would like to ask a question of Jackie, or if you have discovered something which may be of interest to others in making the most of the web, then she would love to hear about that too. Why not email her jackie@laterlife.com

January 2008

Adding toolbars

Q: How can I add a toolbar or individual button that I want to use to my screen so that it is always available?
 

      A:

1. To add a new toolbar, right click on any toolbar (but not on an actual button)! The list of toolbars will appear. Click the name of any toolbar you want to use and it will be added to your screen. All toolbars that are on the screen will have a tick next to their name in the list. (Click a name to take off the tick if you want to remove the toolbar.)

 

2. If a new toolbar arrives and is floating on top of the screen, click in the grey bar across the top and hold down the mouse button. Now drag the bar gently up towards the ruler. When it reaches the ruler, it will suddenly "jump" and park itself underneath the toolbars already present.

3. If you cannot find the new toolbar, but its name has a tick next to it on the toolbar list, it is probably hidden between other toolbars. Look for the buttons you can recognise. Now move your mouse over the vertical dotted line on the left-hand edge and the pointer should show 4 arrows. This is the 'move' arrow. If you want to, you can now drag the toolbar to a different position.

4. To add individual buttons, you can either find extra ones normally associated with the toolbars already displayed, or add unusual ones that may be on any toolbar.
a. To add extra buttons associated with the toolbar, click the down-facing arrow on the right-hand edge of any toolbar and rest the mouse on Add or Remove Buttons. Now rest your mouse on the toolbar name that will appear and extra buttons will be visible. Click any button without a tick to add it to the display.

b. For extra buttons, click the Customize option. When the window opens, click Commands and you can scroll through the categories until you find the relevant toolbar. All the buttons offered in this category will be displayed in the right-hand pane. Click any button you want and drag it up to a current toolbar. The mouse will display a white arrow with a + sign, and the position for the button will show as a black, vertical bar. When it is in the place you want the button, let go the mouse and it will drop into position.

 

c. To remove an unwanted toolbar button, click Customize and then drag the button off the toolbar.

 

Q: How can I track down a web page I visited a few days ago? I cannot remember its name.

A: If you use Internet Explorer, there is a button displaying a green arrow labelled History – find this option under Go in Netscape and check its location if you use a different browser. Clicking this link will open a side bar displaying the days of the week and, under each one, will be a list of folders containing web pages you have visited.

Trace back through these pages and you might be able to find the actual page you are looking for.

You can also click Search and type in part of the name in a Search box to look through your history pages.

Q: How do I know that a page asking for credit card details is genuine and safe?
 

A: If you shop or bank with a reputable company and you open their page directly from your browser, you should be OK to add your details. There will be two clear signs that the site is safe and your details are therefore being encrypted (scrambled). These are https:// in the Address box (rather than http://) and a padlock at the bottom of the screen.

If you double click the padlock, it will open a window detailing the digital certificate that has been provided to authenticate the site (although what this will mean to the average surfer I really can't say!!).

If you receive an email that offers a link in the body of the message to a website (such as your bank's) and then directs you to put in personal details – DON'T. Take your own route to the website and check out your account yourself. This may well have been a fishing (phishing) expedition where you are taken to a fake website.

(Both Firefox and Internet Explorer 7 browsers have phishing-detecting filters, but never rely on these alone.)
 

View previous editions of YoucandoIT for more useful Questions and Answers
 

For a wealth of books on the web and IT generally, visit Amazon and under the books section select Computers and Internet.

Don't forget to visit the general laterlife features section called laterlife interest