Q. Please help me figure out how to use the automatic form-filling feature in the Microsoft Internet Explorer Web browser. When I start to fill out a form on some Web page or another, I hit the first keys for something like my name, and the whole thing appears in a box below, but I cannot get it to appear in the box that I am filling in. Please help.
A. It took me a spell, as well, to figure out how to make Microsoft’s Auto Complete feature work while filling out forms at e-commerce Web sites, and Bill Gates’ programmers should apologize for making it so awkward.
The trick is to type in just enough to make the software complete whatever you are typing. Once it is displayed in the little box below, you need to tap the cursor arrow-down key to highlight the phrase, then strike the Enter key. That will leave that particular line completed, and you can tap the Tab key to jump to the next box in the form to repeat the process.
It just flat-out baffles me why Microsoft’s software geniuses picked this badly non-intuitive method for implementing the wonderful timesaver that Auto Complete can be once you figure it out.
Q. I have a Visioneer scanner that doesn’t work well, and I even bought the TextBridge 9 optical-character-recognition professional software. Whenever I scan printed documents, I still get a mangled version, with lots of garbage and mistakes. Am I missing something? Is there any other software that can help me scan a page properly?
A. Your problem is all too common, Ms. F., and the writers of scanner manuals never seem to explain what is going on. It is absolutely essential to set the resolution high enough for the images that are created when the scanner takes in each page of a document. The software analyzes the image to figure out the letters that make up words. The better the resolution in the image, the more accurate the translation into computer text.
If you check the display that comes up automatically whenever your scanner is run, you will see a setting for resolution in terms of dots per inch. This has to be set at, at least, 400 DPI, and maybe even higher for your computer, to create copies of a printed page that are clear enough for the OCR software to translate into computer-readable text.
The trade-off, of course, is that the higher the resolution, the longer it takes to scan each page, and the more space is required to store the resulting images on your hard drive. I would urge you to experiment with settings before picking the one you will use.
Keep in mind as well that no OCR software will give you 100 percent recognition, and so the goal with scanners always will be how to get results that are mangled the least and yet don’t take forever to create.
Q. I have been getting lots of negative comments from techies who see me running Windows ME on my new computer. They asked me whether I realize that I took a big step backward by replacing Windows 98 with Windows ME. What is your opinion?
A. Tell those cranky techies to get a life and let you enjoy consumer-friendly Windows ME in peace, Ms. T. It’s only we gearheads who should fret about how Windows ME blocks users from performing the sorts of fancy adjustments and tricks that we love to do.
In fact, it is becoming apparent that Windows ME was nothing much more than an effort by Microsoft to put a new and somewhat simplified face on Windows 98, because the company fell behind in finishing the follow-on product that it really wants, Windows XP.
XP, which is due out this fall, will be the long-awaited joint-operating system that uses the exact same software for both the consumer version and the industrial-strength version for corporate customers. Currently, consumers use Windows ME, while businesses run on Windows 2000, a far more stable program that lacks some of the multimedia foolishness consumers relish.
Until XP arrives, we get Windows ME. That’s because 98 sounded mighty stale as the calendar turned over into the 21st Century, and Microsoft was still flogging 20th Century goods. While a lot of good work went into Windows ME, the reality is that it really is more of a new face painted on Windows 98 then a major development.
The new features include greatly improved ways of handling multimedia, including music, motion pictures and photographs. It also improves many small features, such as the built-in file-searching module and the interfaces that one must use to network computers in one’s home.
Tell your techie friends that Windows ME is a step forward, just not a very big step forward. Then sit back, enjoy a fine computing experience and brace yourself for the hype storm Microsoft plans to unleash when it finally gives us that XP operating system, which really will be a big step forward or, maybe, backward.
Q. I purchased a CD-ROM program for translating Swedish into English in June 1999. I needed it again recently, but I got an error message saying that it had expired. I only used it once to translate a letter from my cousin in Sweden.
My one thought is that there is a Y2K problem. What would you do?
A. Short of reporting whoever sold you that software to the Better Business Bureau for extremely dubious ethical practices, I would try fooling the computer into thinking it is once again June 1999, and that President Bill Clinton is mired in the Monica Lewinsky scandal, and that people still haven’t become bored to tears by those stupid early questions on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” and that it still makes sense to buy Nasdaq stocks.
You know the drill, Mr. J. Move your cursor arrow to the lower right corner of the monitor and click on the display of the time. This will bring up the calendar setting display that will let you move the machine back in time, when your Swedish-to-English software was working. Of course, you will need to repeat the process to reset the date after each use of the translation software.
While this is quite a bother, I guess that since it has been two years since you missed it, you shouldn’t be bothered often.
I’ll bet you that the great and imponderable Swedish moviemaker Ingmar Bergman would have loved the idea of a bewildered American using a computer to go back in time in order to read letters from a mysterious Swede.
Q. I had a new Hewlett-Packard computer with Windows ME. Somehow, I managed to cause the background of the desktop to be black, with white and colored letters. It is driving me crazy. I can’t find a way to change it back, nor can anyone I know. I am a klutz from Klutzville. Help.
Mary Eiland @juno.com.
A. Don’t put yourself down, Ms. E. You paid good money for that PC running Windows ME, and you shouldn’t have to apologize for getting things a tad out of whack. I’ll bet you will enjoy yourself experimenting with various screen colors and backgrounds once I tell you how to find the controls that let you transform your beautiful color monitor into black and white blahs.
Right-click with your mouse cursor on the desktop and pick the choice Properties in the box that appears. Choose Appearance in the box that comes up next. There you will find controls to change what Windows calls the Screen Schemes.
To get back to normal, click on the little arrow by the Scheme selector and pick Windows Standard. Then click Apply, and your machine will revert to its original condition. Give a bunch of the other schemes a try, and you might find one you like better than the standard. You will find that the white-on-black scheme is designed to help visually impaired users.
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Contact Jim Coates via e-mail at jcoates@tribune.com or via snail mail at the Chicago Tribune, Room 400, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60611. Questions can be answered only through the column. Add your point of view at chicagotribune.com/go/askjim.
