Neat Net Tricks Issue #97
March 1, 2001

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IN THIS ISSUE:

01.  Size fonts in MSIE
02.  Birthday
03.  Printing bookmarks
04.  Phone number lookup
05.  DOS help
06.  Readers write
07.  URL printing
08.  Internet Phone Wizard
09.  Protonic
10.  Web apps
11.  Free Internet
12.  OpenExpert
13.  eBooks
14.  The Bulletin Board

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01. SIZE FONTS IN MSIE.  Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.x provides a
feature for easily selecting the display font size.  Right click on a
blank area of the toolbar and select Customize from the menu.  From the
list presented, click Size and Add, then close.

02.  BIRTHDAY.  From public records, enter someones name at
http://www.anybirthday.com and chances are good that their birthdate
will be revealed. Well, that is, if they are among the 135 million in
the database.

03.  PRINTING BOOKMARKS in Netscape Communicator has always been
difficult, but one reader has an innovative approach.  Open Bookmarks,
click to select the first entry, cursor to the last entry and Shift+
click to select all. CTRL+C copies these to the clipboard.  Then open
your mail program (CTRL+M is the quickest way), and paste these in an
outgoing message addressed to yourself.  The resulting incoming message
can be printed or otherwise saved.

04.  PHONE NUMBER LOOKUP.  Of the many on the Internet, one of the best
is http://www.anywho.com  providing a reverse number lookup as well as 
neighbors' addresses.  But you already knew that from previous NNT 
tips, didnt you?

05. DOS HELP.  An excellent DOS help site and active DOS discussion
forum is located at http://www.easydos.com .

06.  READERS WRITE.  Regarding a recent NNT tip to overcome the common
stall during defragging, a reader says he finds it easier to disable the
screen saver and restart in Safe Mode (F8 at startup) before doing the
defrag. Another reader suggested double-clicking on My Computer while
holding the Alt key as a convenient path to Device Mgr.

In response to the NNT item about munging email addresses to deter
spamming, reader Kenneth Porter suggests adding the domain ".invalid" 
to the end of the address. This insures that the spam will be blocked at
the first DNS (the spammer's ISP), and the root name servers won't be 
pestered with queries for invalid names. Addresses are parsed right to 
left, so the name servers can quickly discard an .invalid address 
without searching the domain name database. Most spammers are dumb, 
says Kenneth, and they wont trim the ".invalid" from the end of the 
address before attempting to use it, thus reducing  the overall junk 
load on the Net.

We arent able to use all readers comments, but the collective wisdom
is always welcome.

07.  URL PRINTING.  MS Word and WordPerfect formats Web addresses in
html, a useful feature when youre online and want to click to go to the
site.  But printing the document with underlined and colored URL may not
be desirable.  To undo this feature before printing, highlight the URL
and cut it with the tool bar or right-click menu.  Then, leaving the 
cursor in place, click the edit-menu, choose 'Paste special,' and in the
dialogue window highlight'Unformatted text' and click OK. Now the
URL is displayed without any formatting. Take care that the URL is not 
the only entry on the page; otherwise, it will again be reformatted to 
html when the cursor is moved away from it.

08.  INTERNET PHONE WIZARD.  This device allows placing of free or 
low-priced calls over the Internet by simply connecting it between 
computer and phone line, then using your  phone to place the call over 
any of several services without the need for those pesky microphones 
or headsets.  The sound, typical of any of the Internet phone 
connections, is clear at times but sometimes lagged or of rather poor
quality.  The calls are, after all, at the mercy of the Internet.  But
"free" is a nice quality, too.  The Internet Phone Wizard requires 
Windows 98, a USB or 32-bit PCI interface (depending on the model), a 
touch-tone phone and analog telephone line, LAN or modem-based Internet 
connection, and Internet Explorer 4.01 or better. You can read about 
the product at http://www.actiontec.com .

09.  PROTONIC.  Few things on the Internet continue as free services,
so it's a real delight to find a very helpful service still operating
at http://www.protonic.com . You're invited to ask any computer-related
question or step-by-step help on software installation.  I tried 
Protonic and was pleased with the tech's remedy for some driver-loading
problems. Protonic says their service is free because they enjoy 
helping people and are tired of hardware and software manufacturers' 
mediocre support.  And we can all give a resounding nod of agreement to
that!

10.  WEB APPS.  Apps (short for "applications") are free or nearly-free
programs or utilities that run through your browser and require no
installation.  Get more than 10,000 of them at http://www.apps.com .
They are organized nicely for easy searching.

11.  FREE INTERNET.  Freedomlist at http://www.freedomlist.com provides
an extensive listing of free Internet service providers.  The last time
I looked, there were 666 such listings in 52 countries.

12.  OPEN EXPERT.  If you have associated files with a particular
application, (such as .txt files with WordPad,) then clicking on that
type file will automatically open the application.  Or, a right click
on a file opens up a context menu and an "Open with" selection.  But
OpenExpert at http://www.baxbex.com/openexpert.html goes a step further
and allows you to configure applications you may commonly use.

13.  EBOOKS.  The year 2000 has been referred to as "the year of the
eBook".  If you're not familiar with the term, an eBook is digital
reading material, viewed on a desktop, notebook, or dedicated portable
device.  One of the neatest programs I've seen in awhile is the Adobe
Acrobat eBook Reader.  Granted, it's a hefty download, 6.8 mb, but
wait until you see it in action.  It displays eBook pages in full
color and high quality, rotates displays, has full search capability,
allows you to highlight and annotate text, bookmark, and access Web
links.  You can create a personalized library, print passages or the
entire book, and (the feature I like best) use its "read aloud" text-
to-speech to read the entire book, sections, or a single word to hear
the correct pronunciation.  The cost?  Would you believe, it's free,
and you can download it at the NNT Web site's opening page at
http://www.NeatNetTricks.com ; or, go to Adobe's site at
http://www.adobe.com/products/ebookreader/main.html .  There's lots
of eBooks available now in all subjects on the Internet, and their
prices range from free to as much as you want to pay.

14.  THE BULLETIN BOARD.  If you don't visit the NNT Bulletin Board
you're missing an excellent way to get your questions answered. For
example, just in the past week or so, you would have seen these 
intriguing questions discussed: Will "block sender" work with emails
containing a virus?  Does color matter with CD-Rs, or are the 
silver-colored blanks just as good?  What software can be used to 
make a .gif?  Why are downloads from Napster being interrupted?  
Join in, at http://www.escribe.com/bb/nettricks/ .

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NNT makes no endorsement or warranty, expressed or implied, with regard
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Copyright 2001 by Jack Teems.  All rights reserved. Neat Net Tricks is
registered with the U.S. Library of Congress ISSN: 1533-4619.
