Turn computer on and off

To turn on the computer, turn the switch to the on position.

For desktop computers, after using the Start-button Shutdown option, switch the on/off switch into the off position.

For laptop computers, use the Start-button Shutdown option to power the computer down. Otherwise, you’ll be running from battery.

Use the built-in Help Feature

Use the Help menus provided from almost every toolbar and dialog in the system, or simply press the F1 key to get help.

Log on to LWSD network

Follow prompts when on network, you should get an error if the network isn’t connected, or notice that the Network Neighborhood is not available when clicked on.

Start an application

Double-click on a desktop icon (or shortcut).

Double-click a file in the Windows Explorer – can be either an EXE file or an application file that is associated with an EXE.

Select an item from Start-Programs

Click an item on the Office Bar

Click on the Start button and select Run. Type in the name (or path and name) of the file or program you want to run.

Right click on an empty portion of the desktop. Choose New… and select the appropriate item you wish to create.

Cut, copy and paste information from file to file

In one application, use the mouse or keyboard to make a selection, then from the Edit menu, choose Cut or Copy as appropriate. Open the second file, move the cursor to the place where you want to insert the information, then from that 2^nd application’s Edit menu, choose Paste (or Paste Special).

Or, open both files, select text in the first file, then click it and drag it to the desired location in the second file.

Open, move, copy, rename, and delete a file

From the Windows Explorer (Start-Programs-Windows Explorer), right click on a file name. Choose the desired action from the popup menu.

To move via dragging, click on the desired file; drag to the appropriate folder in the left-hand column of the Windows Explorer.

To copy via dragging, click on the desired file, hold down the CTRL key, and drag the file to the appropriate folder in the left-hand column of the Windows Explorer.

To rename, single click on the filename part of the file/program icon and an outline box will appear. Type in the new name for the file.

Within Windows Explorer, use "Edit-Cut" and "Edit-Paste" (or the corresponding toolbar icons, or keystroke equivalents) to move a file from one location to another.

Create, move, copy, rename, and delete a folder

From the Windows Explorer (Start-Programs-Windows Explorer), right click on a folder name. Choose the desired action from the popup menu.

To move via dragging, click on the desired folder; drag to the appropriate folder in the left-hand column of the Windows Explorer.

To copy via dragging, click on the desired folder, hold down the CTRL key, and drag the file to the appropriate folder in the left-hand column of the Windows Explorer.

To rename, single click on the filename part of the folder icon and an outline box will appear. Type in the new name for the file and press the ENTER key to accept it.

Within Windows Explorer, use "Edit-Cut" and "Edit-Paste" (or the corresponding toolbar icons, or keystroke equivalents) to move a folder from one location to another.

Save a file to a file server, floppy disk, and local hard drive

From the application’s file menu, select File-Save (or File-Save As) –or- click the floppy-disk icon in the application’s menu bar.

To save to the server (must be logged in to LWSD), from the Save-As dialog, click on the down arrow in the "Save In" box. Select the Network Neighborhood, navigate to the appropriate file server on the network, navigate to the appropriate folder/directory and click the dialog box’s Save button.

To save to a floppy, include the drive letter for the floppy in front of the file name, e.g., a:myfile.doc.

To save to the local machine from the Save-As dialog, click on the down arrow in the "Save In" box. Select the C drive (your hard disk), navigate to the appropriate folder/directory and click the dialog box’s Save button.

Open, close, minimize, maximize, and resize a window

To open a window, either open an application and select "File-New", or from an open application, select "Window-New Window".

To close a window, either click the X in the upper right corner, or choose File-Close (or File-Exit to close the entire application).

To minimize, click on the Underscore button in the upper right corner of the window. Or right-click on the application’s title bar and choose File-Minimize from the menu.

To maximize (or toggle between max and regular size), click on the middle button in the upper right corner of the window. Or right-click on the application’s title bar and choose File-Maximize from the menu. Or double click on the application’s title bar.

To resize, make sure the window is not maximized, then hover the mouse over an edge of the application’s window, or over the lower right corner. When the mouse cursor changes to a double headed arrow, click and drag the mouse so the window is the desired size.

Use more than one application at a time

After one application is open, start another using any of the above mentioned means to start an application.

Switch between applications by clicking on the Startbar/Taskbar buttons. Or, press ALT+ESC (hold down ALT and press ESC) multiple times to rotate focus between applications (the active application will come to the front and show the title bar in color). Or, press ALT+TAB (hold down ALT and press TAB) multiple times to switch between icons that represent your running applications.

Customize desktop appearance and navigation options

From the Windows Explorer, choose "View-Options" and set icon views, whether multiple windows will remain open, etc.

Right-click on an empty portion of the desktop and choose Properties from the menu. The Display Properties dialog will appear; choose Appearance or Settings, change values as desired, and click the Apply button to accept the new setting options.

Access information on a CD-ROM

Put a CD in the drive (label facing up). Some disks will "AutoPlay" as soon as they are put into the drive (may take 10-20 seconds), others you’ll need to open the Windows Explorer, and access the D drive (image of CD next to the drive letter is a visual cue). Navigate to the appropriate folder/file.

Change mouse speed, speaker volume, screen brightness

Mouse speed: Click on "My Computer" icon on the desktop. Click on "Control Panel", and then click on Mouse icon to change settings.

Speaker volume: Click the Volume control on the Startbar/Taskbar (near the date/time display) and drag the level control(s) to the appropriate location. Or, click on the "My Computer" icon on the desktop. Click on the "Control Panel" icon, then on the "Multimedia" icon. Select the Audio tab and drag the level control to the desired location; click OK to accept the new setting.

Screen brightness: Turn the brightness and contrast the knobs (or slide controls) on the monitor (or side of the laptop screen) to the desired level. Some displays have a software interface to change the brightness of the screen. This is usually accessible from the Control Panel’s Screen icon.

Capture a networked printer

Start button – Settings – Printers - Add Printer. Choose various settings and drivers. You’ll need to know what the make and model is for the printer in order to set the driver correctly. Look at the printer, ask the school tech, check another teacher’s printer settings, or whatever. If it was recently purchased, it is probably an HP 4000 Postscript printer.

Once a printer has been "added" it will show up on the list of printers in the "File-Print" dialog. Click the down-arrow beside the Name textbox and see the list of all the printers that have already been added. Click on a different one if the default printer is not at your desired location, or if it is off-line (out of paper, etc).

Convert a Macintosh file

I believe there is a menu item on the Start - Programs list to help convert Mac files.

Open appropriate application such as WinWord. From the open menu, click the down arrow beside the "Files of Type" box to choose Mac Word format files (or Recover Files of any Type). Navigate to the network location of the Mac file to be converted and click the dialog box’s Open button. Save as a new filename to allow yourself room for messing up without destroying your original file.

Lock your workstation

At any time, with any applications running, press CTRL+ALT+DEL keys at the same time. Click on the "Lock Workstation" button. The workstation will be locked (no one else can access anything on your computer) until you press CTRL+ALT+DEL again and enter your password.

Change your password

After all applications are closed, press CTRL+ALT+DEL keys at the same time. Click on the "Change Password" button. Type in your old password, press the TAB key to move to the next field, type in your new password, then TAB to the next field and re-type your new password.

If your new password is not at least 6 characters long, or if you didn’t enter it the same way twice, you will get an error message. You must also not use the same password within the last 5 or so times you changed your password.

Try to use a combination of upper and lowercase letters and numbers, and avoid using a dictionary word as your password.

Use the "Windows" key

There is a key on your keyboard that has the Windows "flying flag" image on it. This key opens the Start Button menu.

Find the location of a file

On the Start button menu, there is an item called "Find". It will be useful to you when you remember you have a file or folder on your computer, but aren’t sure exactly where it is.

Select Start - Find – Files or Folders. Either enter all or part of a filename, or click on the Date Modified tab or Advanced Feature tab to get a list of all the files modified between certain dates, or those that contain specific text.

Keyboard Navigation

Most things in Windows NT can be done with a keyboard. So if you have a laptop and want to avoid the touch pad, you can pretty much do so. The only real exception is scrolling in a large file, because using the Page Down key won’t move you through the file as quickly as the scroll bar will.

To select an item off of a menu, press ALT plus the underlined letter (for example, to open the file menu, you would choose ALT+F). To go to a sub-menu item, you can also press ALT plus the underlined letter, or use the arrow keys to move up and down, (or to the right and left for subordinate menus). When the correct menu item is highlighted, press ENTER to select it.

In a dialog box, you can use this ALT+ method to navigate between fields whenever they have an underlined letter in the field name.

In a dialog box, you can always use the TAB key to navigate between fields.

In a dialog box, there is generally a "default" button, which will be chosen if you press then ENTER key. This is usually the "OK" button.

Making multiple selections with the mouse

In Windows Explorer, you often want to select more than one file at a time to copy or move when you do file maintenance.

To select files contiguously: Click on the first item then hold down the SHIFT key and click on the last item. All the items including the first and last file appear highlighted when they are selected. Now do your desired operation (Cut, Copy, Move, etc).

To select files non-contiguously: Click on the first item, then hold down the CTRL key while you click on each of the other desired files.

Create, send, reply, forward, recall and attach files in messages

Create: From the menu, select "File-New Message", or click on the New Message icon on the Outlook toolbar.

If you're sending mail to a teacher/staff member in the LWSD district, just type in their name in the To: text box and Outlook will be able to figure out who to send it to (unless there is more than one teacher with a given name, or you don't know the teacher's real name (i.e., Robert instead of Bob, etc). You can always type the full email name of a teacher or non-LWSD person in the To: text box. Optionally, you can Click on the To: button to get a list of people in the LWSD (from the Global Address list), or from your Personal Address Book where you have entered pre-set email addresses, or created Personal Distribution lists containing subsets of individuals that you communicate with frequently.

Be sure to fill in the Subject line with some relevant text; it can be helpful for the recipient to prioritize or organize the mail by its Subject.

Send: After all portions of the outgoing mail are filled in, click the Send button on the "New Message" window’s toolbar, or choose the "File-Send" menu item."

Reply: Select a message (click on the appropriate subject line) from the Inbox. Click the Reply button in the toolbar, or right-click on the message subject line, and choose Reply or Reply-All.Reply-All will send the message to everyone that received the original message. ONLY USE THIS OPTION WHEN NECESSARY. The goal here is not to send a zillion copies of the same thing to people that don't really care what your individual response is; that will only bog down the email server.

Forward: Select one or more messages (click on the appropriate subject line) from the Inbox. If you select more than one message, you have to (should) enter a new subject line. Click the Forward button in the toolbar, or right-click on the message subject line, and choose Forward.

Recall: This is a "way-cool" feature that lets you take back any message you have sent AS LONG AS IT HASN'T BEEN READ YET. So if you made a mistake in your mail, or if you sent it to someone you shouldn't have, you can fix it even after you pressed the Send button.You should get a verification message if you are successful in recalling the message.

If you deleted a message by accident, you can retrieve it from the "Deleted Items" folder BEFORE you exit Outlook.

Open and save attached files

Double-click on the attachment to open it from within Outlook. Only open attachments from KNOWN senders, as an unknown file/application may be infected with a software virus.

Right-click on the attached file, and then choose Save-As from the menu. Save to your Personal folder, or to any desired location on your machine.

Organize, save and delete messages

Create Folders to organize email from different sources. Save email to your hard drive, or to a separate personal folder.

Delete messages by selecting them, then either right-click and choose Delete from the popup menu, or click the X button on the application’s toolbar. These messages will not actually be deleted until you exit Outlook.

Use the Office Assistant

Press F1 and when the Office Assistant (Mr. Paper Clip) appears, type a question containing words with what you want to learn how to do.

Create a Personal Distribution List of addresses to send electronic messages

Create Appointments on the Calendar

Create Contacts

Create Tasks

Organize Appointments, Contacts, and Tasks

Create and organize folders

Create a document

Start WinWord, and you’ll automatically be staring at a new blank document. If Word was already started, then select "File-New" from the menu, or click the empty paper icon from the application’s toolbar.

Type in whatever text you want in your document.

Save a document to a specified location

Select "File-Save As" and enter the new location into the dialog.

Open a saved file from a specified location

Select "File-Open" from the menu, or click the opening folder icon on the application’s toolbar. Click the down arrow on the "Look In" box, and navigate to the desired location (note: default location is your Personal directory).

Or, from the Windows Explorer, navigate to the desired *.DOC file and double-click on it. Note: your documents will most likely be saved in your Personal folder, and we set up a shortcut to this folder on your desktop during the initial "un-boxing" training session. Most Word files have a pre-set file extension association that automatically determines which app to start and load the file. So clicking on a Word *.DOC file will launch Word with that document already loaded.

If the file was "recently" accessed, it will appear on the Start menu - Documents list. You can simply select it there and Word will automatically find it and open it.

Save a file in a format that can be opened on a Macintosh

Select "File-Save As" and click the down arrow on the "Save as Type" window. Select the Mac WinWord file type.

Cut, copy, and paste information

From the Edit menu, choose Cut, Copy, or Paste. Or use the Cut, Copy, and Paste icons on the toolbar. Or select the text to be affected, and right click, and choose the appropriate action from the popup menu.

Use the Spell and Grammar check

Choose "Tools-Spelling and Grammar" from the menu, or click on the "abc" icon on the application’s toolbar.

Use the Office Assistant

Press F1 and when the Office Assistant (Mr. Paper Clip) appears, type a question containing words with what you want to learn how to do.

Preview and print a file

Select "File – Print Preview" from the menu, then click the printer icon on the toolbar, or select "File-Print" from the preview window’s menu.

Customize page setup

Select "File-Page Setup" from the menu. Choose various options from the dialog box.

Set tabs

Select "Format-Tabs" from the menu. Choose various options from the dialog box.

Create, format and customize tables

Select Text that is separated with commas, tabs, or some other character. Select "Table-Convert Text to Table" from the menu, and enter appropriate values in the dialog boxes.

Or once you have a table, select "Table-AutoFormat" menu option and use the wizard to change the format as desired.

Create, format and add graphics from a variety of sources

Select the "Insert-Object" menu and choose an Image or Graphics type to add.

Format paragraphs, text and set styles

"Format – Paragraph" or select desired text and right click on it to get to the desired option. If this is something you do often (or want to do often for the sake of consistency in a lengthy document), you should use "Format-Style". Press F1 to see Mr. Paper Clip for help.

Add Headers and Footers

Select "View-Header and Footer" from the menu. Type in the desired Header or Footer and press Close when done.The Header or Footer can be one or more lines long, and may contain page numbers or other custom information. You can also set the font and font size used in the header.

Use bulleted and numbered lists

Select "Format-Bullets and Numbering" choose appropriate settings, then enter items. Or click the appropriate bullet icon on the application’s toolbar.

Use columns

Select "Format-Columns" from the menu.

Use and create a template

From the menu, select "File-New" and from its dialog, select "Create New Template".

Create a presentation

Open a saved file from a specified location

Save file to a specified location

Use the Office Assistant

Create and present on-screen slide show and overhead transparencies

Use the Slide, Outline, Slide Sorter, Notes and Slide Show Views

Customize the Slide Master

Create a non-linear presentation using Action Buttons

Create, format and add graphics from a variety of sources

Animate text and graphic objects

Add sounds from a variety of sources

Go to a specified page on the World Wide Web

In the URL/Address window, type the address of the page of the form:

http://www.altavista.com

Go to specified locations within a web page

wwmea.lkwash.wednet.edu/users/classdir.htm

Add and organize Favorites

Select page, then choose "Favorites-Add to Favorites" from the menu.

To Organize, choose "Favorites-Organize Favorites" from the menu.

Click on Favorites icon in the toolbar to open a sub-window on the left-side of the Browser window. This button toggles the Favorites list on and off.

Use a search engine to find a Web page

Navigate to one of the search engine websites, then enter the desired text in the textbox and press the page’s "Go" or "Search" button. Suggested search engine sites include (but are by no means limited to):

www.altavista.com

www.yahoo.com

www.msn.com

www.metacrawler.com

www.goto.com

Print information from a Web page

Click on the web page you want to print, then select "File-Print" from the menu, or click the Printer icon in the toolbar.

Copy information from a Web page

Use the mouse cursor to select text on a page, or choose "Edit-Select All" from the menu. Choose "Edit-Copy" from the menu; open the application you want to paste into, and then "Edit-Paste".

Some applications may allow you to select and drag text from the web page directly into an open document.

If you can’t select text (some pages make it hard), you can View-Page Source in Notepad, and copy and paste from there. This will include HTML codes in the resulting page, but at least you’ll get the page content along with it.

To copy an image from a web page, right-click on it and choose "Save Image As" and navigate to a place on your local hard disk to save it.

Customize toolbars

Choose "Tools-Customize" from the menu.

Set the home page location

View and Clear History

Empty Temporary Internet Folder

Use the Wizard

Create a database

Use the Office Assistant

Save file to a specified location

Add fields to a database

Input your information into a database

Sort the information

Filter the information

Adjust/Change the form layout

Export or Send information

Import information

Customize Page Setup

Add Headers and Footers

Add Charts

Add Graphics

Create Relationships

Set permissions and passwords

Use the Auto Correct

Build Forms and Reports

Use the Spell and Grammar Check

Change Form properties

Print a report from a database

Add video from a variety of sources

Use and create templates

Print handouts to accompany a presentation

Create a spreadsheet

Start Excel and you automatically get a new sheet.

Open a saved file from a specified location

Select "File-Open" from the menu, and navigate to the location of the saved sheet.

Or, double-click an XLS file from the Windows Explorer.

Or if the file was recently used, select it from the Start button – Documents list.

Use the Office Assistant

Press F1 and when "Mr. Paper-clip" appears, type a question containing words with what you want to learn how to do.

Save file to a specified location

Select "File-Save As" and navigate to the location you want to save to.

Cut, copy and paste information

Select the desired info, then choose "Edit-Cut" or "Edit-Copy", move to the new location, and then choose "Edit Paste".

Customize Page Setup

Select the "File-Page Setup" menu item.

Preview and print a spreadsheet

Select the "File-Print Preview item" then as appropriate, choose "File-Print" or click the Printer icon on the toolbar.

Add Headers and Footers

Select the menu item "View-Header and Footer" and set the text as appropriate.

Add and modify numerical information

Select a cell; then in the textbox at the top of the sheet, type in the new numbers (or information).

Add, modify, and sort text

Add: Go to a new cell and start typing info.

Modify: Select an existing cell, and edit the contents in the textbox at the top of the sheet.

Sort: Select entire rows to be sorted. Select "Tools-Sort" from the menu and enter fields to sort on, etc.

Create, format and customize charts

Select the data to be charted. Select the "Insert-Chart" menu item and then follow the chart wizard to create the desired look, either on the existing sheet, or on a new sheet.

Calculate the sum and average of a row or columns

Sum: Select the row or column of numbers, then click the AutoSum icon on the toolbar. Or click on the next cell in the row or column and click the AutoSum icon. The result will appear "like magic".

Average: Click on the AutoSum result cell, and see that there is a formula in it. Modify it so the word "Sum" is replaced by the word "Average" and either press Enter or click the green check mark button to the left of the editing textbox.

Use Formulas to do calculations

Go to a new cell, type a math formula beginning with an equals sign:

=4+(10*3)

Instead of an actual number, you can give a cell-name or cell-range. Check the Office Assistant to find different ways to select a range of cells. For example:

=4+(B5*3)

or

=4+(AVERAGE(A1:A6) * 3)

Format the cells, rows and columns

Select the cell, then either right-click and choose the appropriate format from the popup menu, or select the "Format-Cells" menu item (or "Format-Rows" etc. as desired).

Create, format and add graphics from a variety of sources

Select "Insert Picture" from the menu, and choose the appropriate style of graphic from a file saved somewhere on your hard drive or on the network file server.