I made a new friend in the office this week (via email, since I’m not actually there). His name is Jim and, as I’ve been told, he’s the go-to guy for grammar questions. Now, usually I’ve got a pretty good handle on how you’re supposed to write things [*whether I use it all the time or not*] but here are a few helpful words Jim passed on to me, to help keep News From the Edge looking good. They’ll probably also be useful for other people, like me who need to be writing regularly about stuff that they’re not 100% sure of:

“…in techland a common set of gotchas is “backup” “back up”, as well as “setup” “set up”. “Backup” and “setup” are nouns – “Did you check the backups?” “Is this setup correct?” But in a verb-context, it should be “Back Up Your Mac!” (btw, “Up” is capitalized because it’s not a preposition here – it’s a particle completing the verbal phrase “back up”) Oh, “login” and “log in” too: “What is your login name?” “Did you log in yet?”

Wow!! This may not make a difference to anybody else, but it was pretty helpful to me. Thanks, Jim!

I’ve definitely got to figure out what all these internet slang terms mean! Otherwise, there’s no way to moderate this blog!

Okay, so this part is probably only going to be new to me… but here it goes, anyway.

I was told before I came back home (I’m living in North Carolina right now, telecommuting between here and Ann Arbor via the wonder of the internet) that if I had any problem hooking up my Virtual Private Network, that I could call the home office and they could “remote access” my PC and help me out. So why it was a surprise to me to see my cursor moving without any pursuasion on my part, I don’t know… but it was.

Here’s the thing: we need to use the VPN to do certain tasks, like accessing “applecrisp,” using Microsoft Outlook (which is SO MUCH EASIER than Webmail) and various other tasks. The VPN, as Bruce described it, creates a virtual tunnel, through which I can send and receive information without a third party watching. So, if I need to pull something off our server… say it’s a schematic for our marketing materials… I can get that from MI to NC safely without any of our competitors looking at it. Brilliant!

The best part is, I didn’t even have to call! I was able to use our custom-made Instant Messenger program [that is sometimes called "Pandion" and sometimes called "Pidgeon" ...?] to let Justin know I was in distress. He gave me some pretty simple directions, and all of the sudden, I was watching the car drive itself, so to speak.

And while its kinda creepy to watch your computer type passwords, access Websites and troubleshoot itself (well, sort of…) Its sooooo cool at the same time.

*** notice all the oooo’s above? This is apparently a big no-no with Google. I guess they don’t like excessive punctuation marks either. You may want to note this if you’re working on your SEO…

ttyl!

stormie

Up until about two weeks ago, I’d been using Mac stuff for the past… well, lets estimate ten years. I’ve been using PCs occasionally, like when I needed to find a certain book at the public library… and to log in at the DMV. So that said, I’ve got a few things to pick up on with regard to PC computing.

Here’s one example: In the past, I’ve only used screen shots to save a picture of my desktop if my fickle Apple told me that a fatal error had occurred, and that the program I was using needed to be shut down. This almost always happened when I reached the 2/3 mark in a great article I was writing (with a killer lead that took half a day to nail down…) The screen shot allowed me to take a picture of those prized words, so that I wouldn’t have to conjure up another 700 words or so. It was kismet! Screenshots saved my life more than once.

But yesterday, I got to try and figure out this awesome function on a PC… so that I had a nifty little Excel window snapshot for News From the Edge - our quarterly newsletter that I’m putting together for the first time.

Those of you who are versed in PC will already know that there’s a button on the keyboard that says “Prt Sc.” That’s all well and good, but “Prt Sc.” means nothing to me. On my familiar friend, the Mac, to do a screenshot you hold down the “shift,” “apple” and “3″ keys all at once. That takes a picture that lands on your desktop in a .jpg format! Sweet!

Using my favorite search buddy, I looked up “Screen Shots” and found out that there are lots of kind folks who want to share this info with me! But there was one problem remaining… all their diagrams were showing regular keyboards. Their keyboards have a separate area where the “Print Screen” button is located (note: the words are spelled out on a full keyboard.) And this looks nothing like the key area on my gorgeous new laptop.

I’m not going to tell you how long it took me to find “Prt Sc” because that’s just embarrassing. But now, whenever somebody searches “site:www.dynedge.com Screenshots” they’ll come here, and feel better.

They say you learn something new every day!

When you click this link, I can promise you two things: First, you will laugh because Copy Cat is so cute and hilarious. Second, you will be delighted by how simple this application is to install and use (The directions are simple enough for even me to follow!)

So, check it out!

http://www.copyfilepath.com/

Right click on any file, click Copy File Path, and get a link that you can simply paste into any email.

Try it! Its easy and free… so why not? Man! I love working with smart people. Where do they come up with this stuff?

I thought this part might be nice to mention, for all you people (like me) who are still WAY outside your comfort zone when it comes to a lot of this stuff. Here are some things that I love about DE that make my life - and yours - a little easier.

To start, I just found out that if any of our clients has a minor problem with a system we’ve set up [*we're not talking about a crash or file recovery issue here, though people!] they can call one of our consultants and ask for help. Well, you probably already knew that part, but this is where it gets good: if your problem is something that we can talk you through in 12 minutes or less, guess what? You don’t pay for it. I didn’t think ANYBODY did that!

Better yet, if you haven’t called over to DE lately, you should give it a try. I was really scared accepting this position because I know that everybody here is some sort of computer wizard. I was totally expecting to get lost in the lingo of the Techno-Elitists, but I couldn’t be more pleasantly surprised.

Here’s one example: After I finish typing this blog, I’m going to download a 1-Up form for my new friend Jon, one of our consultants who pulled a “Wow the DynEdger” with the promise of a “Follow Through” in the coming week while I try and get my home networked to function properly.

I was trying to figure out the name of the “Copy Filepath” application, so that I could write about it, but I was totally drawing a blank. I was using as many descriptors as possible to hopefully jog his memory, when I gave up.

I was in the middle of telling him that I realize I’m not making any sense at all when he said “You’ve got to realize that it’s my job to understand what somebody is saying, even when it doesn’t make sense.” Wow. Not only was that a huge relief for me, but I knew that if our consultants can understand my scattered explanations, they must be lightning-fast at diagnosing our client’s needs.

I think I’ll recommend a hi-five and two bucks for Jon. Thanks so much for making my life a lot easier this week!