Up until recently I had my phone automatically not even ring unless it was a number my phone recognized as someone I had in my extensive contact list (nearing 2000 entries at this time).

Now, as I have accepted a position on a Zoning Appeals Board, I have had to turn that off as I will be getting calls from the general public. The number of spam calls is annoying to say the least.

By Will Culbertson (Willhc) on Tuesday, October 26, 2021 - 02:08 pm: Edit

Get a Google Voice number for that. That way, you can tell when things come to that number instead of your normal cell number. It has a separate voice mail box as well. When you're done with it, you can detach it from your phone and never be bothered with it again

By Mike Erickson (Mike_Erickson) on Tuesday, October 26, 2021 - 05:51 pm: Edit

I second that recommendation to consider Google Voice. It's useful, free, and well worth a try.

One doesn't even need to forward the GV number to actually ring a real phone anywhere. It can go right to the configurable voicemail, and then email you a transcript of the call when a new one comes in.

Also, we switched our primary home landline to GV a few years back (via OBI Talk), and now pay $0 per month for home phone service. It has easily saved us hundreds of dollars over the past years.

--Mike

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Wednesday, October 27, 2021 - 12:05 pm: Edit

Never heard of Google Voice, but it seems like Google is worse than the Borg when it comes to taking over EVERYTHING!


Garth L. Getgen

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Thursday, October 28, 2021 - 11:45 am: Edit

Well, it is either Google, Amazon or Facebook.

https://gizmodo.com/google-removes-nearly-all-mentions-of-dont-be-evil-from-1826153393

By Randy Green (Hollywood750) on Thursday, October 28, 2021 - 08:58 pm: Edit

Lots of AWS cloud stuff around now, for sure.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Thursday, November 18, 2021 - 01:42 pm: Edit

Asking out of curiosity, but this did happen.

Does anyone know of a combination of keys that can be pressed in some order or other that results in a keyboard being (for want of a better term) "locked," such that if you press a key nothing shows up on your screen and the computer does not take an action it should?

This seemed to happen to me recently. I was trying to reply to a message on this board, but my keyboard was not connecting with the computer (apparently). No message appeared in the message box, I couldn't get the computer to open a new screen, and other fun and games. his morning I came in and unplugged the keyboard and plugged it back in and it seems to be working okay, but still. . .

By Steven Zamboni (Szamboni) on Thursday, November 18, 2021 - 03:29 pm: Edit

USB ports sometimes go to sleep and the computer no longer sees whatever is plugged in there. Unplug/replug usually works. Could be tarnish or a damaged connector or gremlins. (Sometimes you may have to switch to a different plug so the computer can discover your "new" keyboard.)

There are key combinations that will mess up a board, but most of them will survive a replug.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Thursday, November 18, 2021 - 04:15 pm: Edit

Steve Zamboni:

Thanks.

Steven P.

By Patrick H. Dillman (Patrick) on Sunday, November 21, 2021 - 12:27 am: Edit

Switching the polarity receptacle works for me most of the time.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Saturday, December 11, 2021 - 01:06 pm: Edit

Okay, so on my wife's new computer, I was going to copy all her bookmarks over form the old machine, and I noticed something odd. The user name to log in is "Celestia", but her folder is "C:\Users\celes". No idea how that could have happened. Worse, I have no idea how to fix it. I doubt I can simply rename the folder because it's tied to the log-in account. Thoughts??


Garth L. Getgen

By Paul Franz (Andromedan) on Saturday, December 11, 2021 - 01:31 pm: Edit

If it really bothers you, you can follow the directions at https://www.openguru.com/2020/07/how-to-rename-windows-10-user-home.html

This assumes that the new computer is not running Windows 11.

Note: This is definitely a hack/workaround. Because the only reason you need to create the symbolic link from the old directory to the new directory is because the account itself will still point to the old directory as the home directory.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Thursday, March 10, 2022 - 05:44 pm: Edit

I have six one-page WORD documents (charts for a game) that my brother sent to me. Four are in portrait mode and two are in landscape. I'm trying to combine them into one single file. I tried copy-all for each and paste into a new document, but I can't figure out to tell WORD that two of them are landscape. It wants to make them all portrait or all landscape. And I can't find the option to rotate them before copying.

I'm sure there's a way to do it. Can someone please give me a hint on this? Thanks!!


Garth L. Getgen

By Steven Zamboni (Szamboni) on Thursday, March 10, 2022 - 06:05 pm: Edit

Place cursor at start of page you want to flip. Select Layout-Breaks-NextPage to add a section break (this will probably be invisible). Keep the cursor where it is and select Orientation at the top of the screen.

Repeat when you need to flip it the other direction in the next section.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Tuesday, March 22, 2022 - 10:21 pm: Edit

THE AGONY OF THE CELL PHONE
On 28 Feb I got a text message. I don't do many texts and maybe half of the time I manage to get my phone to show it to me, and it's mostly spam. This one was curious. It did not say who it was from or what it was about, it just said "UPGRADE TO CONTINUE SERVICE." It did not say what to upgrade or what service I was to continue. I assumed it was another phish thing and just ignored it. It should have said "TO CONTINUE TRACFONE, BUY A NEW G4 PHONE" and it should have been sent a month earlier than it was.

The next day, March 1st, my 13-year-old G3 cell phone stopped working. I noticed it eventually and told Leanna. She did 30 seconds of Google and told me that Verizon had bought Tracfone and discontinued their G3s with one day of warning to a few hundred thousand customers who had G3s.

Not sure what to do, I asked Leanna, who sent me to a nearby business ADB and my family have used many times. They said they would take care of it. Things did not go well. They told me that the cheapest cell phone that would work with Tracfone was $400, that the smallest cell phone currently on the market was twice the size of my G3, and that they would have me up and running in 24 hours. None of that turned out to be true. Ten days later they gave up trying to take care of it and gave me back my old phone which they had broken in the meantime. Oh well, not like there was anything in it other than some photos I had already copies and some phone numbers I had written down elsewhere. I am still waiting for them to process my refund which somehow will take seven days when Leanna can refund money to you guys in 7 minutes.

Next, I went on-line and did 5 minutes of research. Tracfone said they could sell me a new phone for $25 and that I could just drive to Walmart and buy it off the Tracfone shelf. I checked Walmart's website (four phone for that price in stock) and call the store (all in stock, come on down) and drove ten miles to the store (none in stock, we haven't had any of those this year, the inventory system is always wrong and we floor sales clerks never both to check or update it).

Back to the Tracfone website, phone is in stock, costs $10, I get a $10 off coupon and free shipping. They sent the phone which arrived at the ADB office the only morning of the month Jean isn't there (cleaning lady day). I called UPS who said they would reroute it to a UPS store at a certain address and it would absolutely positively be there at 5pm that same day if I just paid them $6 for that service. I paid, the "UPS store" turned out to be a CVS pharmacy which I only found by asking the UPS driver who stopped at the gas mart next door for a coke, and the phone was not there at 5pm. I waited to 6pm and it was still not there and the clerk said they would not get any more UPS that night. The next day I got there early and no phone. It finally showed up at 6pm the second day.

Then I called Tracfone to get my phone number and unused minutes transferred. Five hours later the nice lady said she had done that, but I had to talk to the registration desk before the phone would work. She transferred me there, but the robot told me that there would be a one hour wait, they would call me back, and hung up. They did not call back. Two days later (yesterday) I got an email saying my phone was transferred and good to go and gave me simple instructions (which did not work). Four hours on hold produced only a robot saying they were closing for the day and I should call back on Tuesday. We called on Tuesday (today) and after three hours on hold got a nice lady who managed to get the phone to work after only 75 minutes of clickity clack typing.

I do not live and die by my cell phone. I don't play games, watch movies, browse website, do email, check stocks, and I never ever text anyone (other than to say "Please do not text me. Call me"). Being without a phone for 3 weeks was in some ways nice (no spam) but in some ways very inconvenient (I missed one doctor appointment and missed a note they had rescheduled another one). No end of people who I actually wanted to hear from left a voicemail (which did not survive the transfer to the new phone) but did not try to call my house or office since after all they left a voicemail on my cell.

This has added to my stress and anxiety for the last 22 days but it is, at last, over.

Now if I could just figure out how to get my new phone to answer an incoming call. It has to be one of these four buttons. Unless it's not.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Tuesday, March 22, 2022 - 11:05 pm: Edit

I had to retire my flip phone last year. I feel your pain. I do use text on my "smart" phone with my brother, but otherwise most of its features are wasted on me. Monthly bill doubled.


Garth L. Getgen

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Wednesday, March 23, 2022 - 12:09 am: Edit

Family plans make smart phones cheaper. Tracfone was how I started my kids. My parents finally dumped their flips for smart phones. It’s a slippery slope now my dad can’t stop watching YouTube haha

By Mike Erickson (Mike_Erickson) on Wednesday, March 23, 2022 - 12:39 am: Edit

We're on Consumer Cellular, the phone plan for senior citizens. I'm not quite there yet, but my phone is ready!

--Mike

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Wednesday, March 23, 2022 - 08:21 am: Edit

Cricket. Unlimited data and phone calls fro $100 a month for the 4 of us.

And the phones themselves are cheap. The smallest smart phones are pretty tiny.

When I become king I will outlaw locked in phones. AFAICT this is already the case in Europe and the Philippines.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Wednesday, March 23, 2022 - 04:20 pm: Edit

Family plans are useless for those of us without kids. "Four lines for $50 per month." Okay, so what's the price for two lines?? $200 per months. Half the number of phones /users but same overall price.


Garth L. Getgen

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Thursday, March 24, 2022 - 08:41 am: Edit

$60 for 1, $20 for an additional line. $100 for 4.

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica_Orsini) on Thursday, March 24, 2022 - 08:57 am: Edit

I'm good with Straight Talk. $45/month, with effectively unlimited everything.

By Ed Meister (Edthefed) on Thursday, March 24, 2022 - 09:03 pm: Edit

Anyone here have any experience with Quickbooks for Nonprofits? We use it at my church but it's from 2009 and could really use an upgrade. Plus I don't know how easy it will be to migrate all of the data over to the new version.

By Steven Zamboni (Szamboni) on Friday, March 25, 2022 - 04:50 pm: Edit

I manage Quickbooks Online for the library's non-profit arm. Techsoup has discounted subs for non-profits.

Our migration from the desktop version (no idea which one) to Online was painless. We sent Intuit an export and they loaded it into Online for us. Recreating the user accounts took a couple minutes.

By John Wyszynski (Starsabre) on Monday, April 04, 2022 - 09:03 pm: Edit

Elon Musk complains about Twitter censorship...

so he buys 9.2% of the stock and becomes the largest shareholder.