Clip Art, Photos, Recent Discoveries

         What a clever picture.  It grabbed my attention and I just had to read what the article said.  Ever said that?
    Google to the rescue.  Well, first I emailed John Carter to ask where he’d found the photo he posted to the pmug.us website.  

         So, I followed his directions and now I can show it to you.
         Google makes it easy to bring up lots of illustrations, clip art, photos.  Here’s a screen shot of the entry I made:  (Click to enlarge this; click again to get back to this page)
    In the search box I had typed “street sign, confused, lost, unclear” not knowing any more descriptive terms for what I wanted.  The first search page allowed me to select “Images.”  
        A huge selection came up, and I could click Show More Results at the bottom of the page.  Click on any illustration and see what the information says.  Some will be stock photos with an embedded watermark.  That means you’ll need to read about licensing, extended license, additional multi-seat License.  Copyright info is on that company’s page.  Click to view Photos, Vectors, Footage, Audio, Mobile, Pricing.  See the company’s phone number, live help number.
      One photo I looked at had a tiny icon in the upper right hand of the page.  Here’s a screen shot of the list that came up. 
      It was fun, clicking to see how the various languages came up in the illustrations. 
        Try it out on some of your blogging or emails.  Your family will be impressed with your knowledge of other languages.

         Looking up “shepherd and sheep”  I scrolled down and when I’d gotten to the 64th picture I found a photo of my son Peter, holding his sheep on his shoulder.  I had posted it to my blog, www.EncouragingU.blogspot.com months ago and  they’ve put it up for anyone to help themselves to the picture.  Clicking on it brings up that page in my blog, with the verses I posted with it.  And on the Google Image page a person can click, bringing it up as JPG 800x533 pixels. 
         We hadn’t thought that it would be automatically available to anyone else.  Hopefully, if someone wanted a copy they’d write and ask for permission.  Maybe that’s wishful thinking, on my part.

Other Recent Discoveries: 
        Planning on selling that nice, older Mac and upping to something new?  You might get some helpful info here:  http://www.mactip.net/how-to-securely-wipe-your-mac-hard-drive-before-selling-it/
        We did decide to go for a new iMac to replace the G4 laptop that Don’s been using.
What do do with a 10 year-old that’s still running, but is before Intel?  We saw the PC column in Courier about recycling or donating.  Asked for info from Prez Art Gorski and John Carter.  John was first to reply, suggesting we donate it to the DAV (Disabled American Veterans) in Prescott. A very knowledgeable man there was happy to take it, and we’re delighted to be able to help someone that way. 
        Curious about all those nifty computers from Apple before you took the plunge and bought yours?  http://apple-history.com/pg4   lists highlights from 1976 to 2012. 
        Wondering about the security of your Contact list, alias Address Book?  http://arstechnica.com/security/2013/10/how-apples-address-book-app-could-allow-the-nsa-to-harvest-your-contacts/
        Keeping up with the latest info posted to our PMUG newsblog?  Look into NetNewsWire  https://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/10350/netnewswire  I didn’t see a date on this page. 
        With schools and businesses using iPhones and iPads here’s what’s new with features to help the IT shops lock iOS down and make it easier to manage.  http://arstechnica.com/apple/2014/02/apples-new-management-features-help-locked-down-ipads-stay-locked-down/
IT’S ALMOST TIME  for nominating PMUG officers for the May election. Give it some thought.  Your experience could mean some encouraging help for others.  You know how much we appreciate your time and your willingness to step up to this challenge.  You help make PMUG a success! 
        Have a chat with Prez Art Gorski, or Vice Prez Dave Rothgery, or Secretary Bobbie Pastor, or Treasurer David Passell.  Or talk to one of the appointed Chairs: John Carter, Ward Stanke, or a Past Prez: Jim Hamm or Howard LaPittus. Each of them has survived as they served our friendly organization!     * * * 

This was today's handout from Elaine Hardt at the PMUG meeting.  See you next time! 

Smart Phone Used in Medical Treatment

        An 8-minute video illustrates what Jim Hamm says,  "Here is an interesting story on how a smart phone can be used in medical treatment. One of the features covered is where, say, a diabetic needs to monitor his or her blood glucose frequently. So easy to do with a smart phone and sensor.
        "Smart phones have already had a significant impact on our lives, with more to come, it seems."  Look here

Antivirus Program Described

        "I use the free Avast antivirus (AV) program on both my Macs and Windows computers," Jim Hamm begins.   "I like it, and it is light on computer resources. In case you might an interest in Avast,  here is a comprehensive article about this AV program. The article happens to cover installation on a Windows computer, but the process is basically the same for a Mac.
        "Some might question whether an AV program is needed on a Mac. Rather than ponder this philosophical question, I just go ahead and use Avast. I see no downside to doing this, and a possibility of an upside."
        Read  this info and note the chart comparing Avast with seven other well-known antivirus programs.  And there's that word:  FREE. 

Practical Privacy

    "Here is an interesting article on browser privacy mode," remarks David Passell.  "A use that really stood out for me was the way to circumvent the NY times 10 article/month limit. I will have to try that since I used to get a lot of news from NY Times site before they began charging. Now I use the freely available BBC news site."  Look here. 
       If you're using Safari and have clicked Block Cookies Always, and are continually aggravated at the number of Cookies noted, you might see if Private Browsing works for you.

Ideas and Shortcuts

  Jim Hamm presented some helpful tips to the AMUG Senior SIG today, and shares these links with us. 

    more from Lifehacker:  http://lifehacker.com/tag/101
9) (item obsolete - admin)
10) 50 Best Mac Tips: http://www.techradar.com/

Sharing Documents With Other Users

        "This cannot be stressed enough,"  so naturally we listen up to what John Carter has to say.   "No matter what application you use to create a document, if you want to share that document with a non-Apple user, then you must save the document in a format that anyone can open. That format is either TXT, PDF, RTF or RTFD.
         "A TXT file (.txt) is a plain file and can be opened by anyone with a number of different applications. But this format cannot include many special fonts, any fancy formatting (tabs are allowed) or any images.
         "PDF is the Adobe Postscript Document format. The Mac uses Preview to view this format. Windows must use Adobe Reader. When you save or export a document in PDF format, what the other people see is exactly what you created the document as.
         "RTF is the Microsoft Rich Text Format. The Mac uses Preview to view this format. Windows can use Word, Wordpad, or Notepad to view this format. What the other people see most likely will NOT be exactly as you see it. Microsoft will substitute fonts and may even change some formatting. If images are embedded in the document, chances are they won’t be in the right place. There may be severe restrictions on formatting and image types that can be employed in an RTF format.
         "RTFD is similar to RTF and also allows some fancy formatting and some image types. When using TextEdit to create a document, this is the default format if certain fonts or images are included."
         But that's not all.  John goes on with more details.
         "However, if you use either NeoOffice, OpenOffice, or LibreOffice to create a document in the OpenDocument format (see this link for a description of OpenDocument format) and if the Windows user has either OpenOffice or LibreOffice, then whatever you create and save in the default format they will be able to open and it will appear to them exactly as you see it with only one possible side effect — fonts may be substituted if the user doesn’t have exactly the same font installed on his/her machine. This may not alter the appearance any, or slightly if at all.
         "In Windows and starting with MS Office 2007 using a free plugin called OpenXML/ODF Translator (available here) , a user could open an OpenDocument file, but the document may not survive formatting and some fonts may be substituted. Although MS Office attempted to comply with the OpenDocument standards, Microsoft still insisted on making some changes of their own.
         "If you do use NeoOffice, OpenOffice or LibreOffice to create an OpenDocument file and you want to share it with another Apple user, then he/she can open it with TextEdit. But not Pages, Numbers or Keynote because these Apple products don’t know anything about the OpenDocument standard.
      "Just so you know, the extensions for an OpenDocument file are as follows:
            Text = .odt
            Presentation = .odp
            Spreadsheet = .ods
    "The equivalent for MS Office (prior to 2007) is:
            Text = .doc
            Presentation = .ppt
            Spreadsheet = .pps
   "For a complete treatise on the new MS Office extensions, see this link.
    "The equivalent for Apple is:
            Text = .pages
            Presentation = .keynote
            Spreadsheet = .numbers
            "Before sharing a document with anyone, make sure that they have the right application to work with the document you want to share.
              "For the general differences in use between OpenOffice and MS Office, see this link. For John Carter’s presentation notes on the differences between .docx and .odt, see this link and open the PDF file “MS Word 2010 vs OpenOffice 3.0."