Tech Tips 5

 

 

 

Screen Shots

If you want to save or print something you see on your computer screen, but can’t save through normal means, you can take what’s called a “screenshot”… Pressing the “Print Screen” button in the upper right part of your keyboard will take a picture of the entire screen. “But where is the picture?” you ask… It’s in the computer’s memory! So all you need to do is “paste” it somewhere. If you are in an email message you can paste it; or a Word document; or any program. This is useful for capturing error messages that you want to send an email about. It’s also useful for creating directions for computer projects.

Pressing the  “Alt” key at the same time as the “Print Screen” key will take a picture of only the top (active) window – which is useful since you’re rarely trying to capture the entire screen, usually you just want whatever is showing in the active window.

I had to use a screenshot to capture the image at left from a web site, because the web site didn’t let you use “copy” or “save” (due to technical limitations, not copyright). After taking the screenshot, I pasted it into this email. If you want to check out the Switcheroo Zoo go to http://www.switchzoo.com/zoo.htm It’s pretty neat—if you have Flash installed, you can create your own animals.

If you take a screenshot, it stays in the computer’s memory until you “copy” anything else, or log-off, or shut-down.

 

 

Right-click & Right-Drag

            Most people know that right-clicking will give you a context-menu that relates to whatever you’re right-clicking on top of. Common choices would be: cut, copy, paste, delete, rename, etc.  You might not know that you can also “right-drag” something, so instead of doing a normal drag where you hold down the left button, instead, you hold down the right button as you drag an item. Then, when you release the button when you’re on top of your destination, you get a context menu with the following choices: copy here, move here, create shortcut here, or cancel. I use this a lot when I’m organizing my files, so that I don’t end up with duplicates of items – I use the “move here” choice.

           

 

Projector Tips

·    Turning On & Off: For all of our projectors, you press the “On/Off Power” button on the remote (or on the projector) to turn on the bulb. This button is the one on the top-left on most remotes. You have to hold the button down for about 2-3 seconds, especially when turning it off. (originally I had said press the button twice to turn it off, but it’s easier to just hold down the button til it goes off)

·    If it doesn’t appear to be coming on: The bulbs take awhile to reach full brightness after you turn them on. If you turn on a projector, but then press the button again because you’re not sure if it’s on, this second pressing of the button is actually telling the projector to turn off the bulb, and it will take a few minutes before you can turn it back on.

·    $500 bulbs: Please be sure to turn off the projector bulbs when you are done with your lesson. Since the projector bulbs are expensive it is important not to remove power from the projector until the fan has had a chance to cool off the bulb. (this only applies to the projectors on the carts – the mounted projectors always have power).

·    The special keys to get the image from the computer image onto the screen are Fn and F5.

More… Help Sheet on Projectors

 

 

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