U3A Computing Beginners Class Autumn 2013 course Leader – Brian Moore Week 3 of 10 weeks. Mondays 4:15 to 5:45 pm Half Term – Miss 21st and 28th of October

An Invite to NEW U3A Members The committee would like to invite all new members, who have joined Crewe and Nantwich U3A after October 2012, to join us for coffee (or tea) and a cake on Wednesday November 6th at 2.30pm at Wistaston Memorial Hall. It is an opportunity for new members to get to know the committee and each other and to put any questions or suggestions you may have concerning the U3A.

Re Cap When logging in the password must be exact. Is u3a.monday Last week we learnt about = Files and Folders in My Documents. Copy and Paste so that they can be moved. Common Files in S: drive. Programs open as a Window. Using Alt & Tab to switch between Windows. Libraries – A new feature. Adding more locations. Correction. We will still be using Office 2007.

This week – The Internet Is a vast array of interconnected Computers. Main uses are = World Wide Web. Hence the www in site names. – Sending letters by a computer. Newsgroups – News on a particular subject – not used much now.

World Wide Web Vast collection of information to search for. Copies of what you search for are widespread so it’s hard for information to go completely missing. Once something is published it can never be withdrawn. To view you need a computer connected to the Internet and a Browser program – Usually Internet Explorer. Are others – Firefox & Google Chrome but no great need to change. Currently the latest version of Internet Explorer is V10.

After logon. Click on Start bottom left then Internet Explorer

Internet Explorer Layout Back to RH Click here to Earlier Later Dropdown list of earlier pages get this list Tools Pages. Current Another tabbed Options Refresh page page behind Go to Home page URL or Web Site Favorites Print Find on this page A Secure site- Lock symbol (Preview) or GO or Compatibility symbol Menu bar Command bar

Using Internet Explorer The top dark blue row at the top shows the current web page “Title”. Hopefully the web designer has put something descriptive. If you have been visiting many pages you can use the big arrows to go back/forwards over the sites visited. Unfortunately this does not work completely if you have been in “Secure” web sites as used by Banks. They start with and have a Lock Symbol in orange. Usually they provide a link to go back to earlier pages in the body of the page and may even warn you not to use the arrows.

You will get warnings when entering and leaving “Secure” pages – answer “Yes”. Next is a down arrow which show a list of previous pages. You can select as required. Next is a Green Refresh which forces the page to be reloaded. In the next long box is the web site you are currently at. Just as every residence has a unique street address, every webpage has its own web address. That address is called the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) or simpler – Web Site. Eg the URL for the Microsoft main website is

If you know the URL for a page, you can type it directly into Internet Explorer. Then, Click the Green Go button or press ENTER to go to the website. You don't have to type For example, you can type and Internet Explorer will fill in the rest. The URL or web site address has to be entered exactly with no spaces. The case does not matter so it’s simplest to use lower case or small letters throughout. Because the URL has to be exact most people use a search engine instead. EG its easier to just search for “U3a Nantwich” than to type in the address bar.

Tabs Tabs. Allows to switch between several active web sites. Here I am on a page about Ebay. If you click on a new tab here you get an empty new page to work with. You can go back to eg Cat - Wikipedia by clicking on it again. Many new Tabs are allowed. But you could just start another Internet Explorer running. Best use one for each subject & tabs for detail.

First Page shown When you start Internet Explorer, it goes to whatever webpage is set as the home page. Here at St Thomas More it currently goes to MSM. To get back to your home page at any time, click the Home button (has a House Icon). To change your Home page it’s a little advanced. Get the web page you want. Click on Tools, Internet Options, Use current, OK.

Search Engines Search engines enable you to find relevant information on the Web easily. You type a few key words (or phrases) and the Search engine returns pages which it thinks a will be relevant. Here at St Thomas More they use “bing”. From Internet Explorer 10 the long web site box can also be used for entering a search term, then press enter. It will then search using “bing”. Google is the leader in “Search Engines” but “Ask Jeeves” is better at searching a phrase.

With Google, if a phrase in enclosed in quotes then it will search for the exact phrase only, not just the individual words in any order. Eg "London guide to discover the many“ is in 3 places only. Try this later without the quotes, you get 150,000,000 matches. Putting a “+” sign in front of a word will only find articles containing that word. Similarly “-” will only find articles NOT containing that word. This is very useful because a problem of search engines is too many results. Google has an Advance Search which uses this. If its a brand name you are searching for, Google will do its best to include Adverts.

Favorites etc US spelling only Internet Explorer (IE) allows a user adjustable list of Favourite web sites for easy access. Another name for the same thing is “Bookmarks”. Its the yellow star on the right Just select what you want and it will enter that site. Some are in Yellow Folders. If you have found a interesting site and want to save it, click on “Add to favorites” and verify or change its name. There is also a History Tab to allow easy access to site visited up to a week ago. Feeds, best Google it

RH click in a blank area just left of the “Home” button. Tick to get the Menu bar then. Under “File”, Print is useful but beware web pages don't conform to A4 paper size and may waste lots of paper. Check this with Print PreView. Better to copy what you want to a Word document and print that. “Edit” has cut, copy & paste as talked about last week. “Find on this Page” is useful. Try it later. “View” In Toolbars & Explorer Bars, don't have too many ticked – they take up too much room. Full Screen is useful, use F11 to put back as was.

Practical The world is your Oyster now! If you want to know something, somebody in the world is bound to know about it. Finding it is the real skill. Today, just a few ideas. You will need to type them in (or Google them). Try Find on this page, Forward/Back, Make as a Favorite, Another Tab, Change Home Page

When is Spring Half Term here? What is the Amazon price for “Lawn Grub Killer 20Sqm” Answer= £3.49 On Login as = and password= u3a.Monday I am known as Brianu Mooreu. Edit the profile if you Quiz

Customising Internet Explorer Click on Start, you can see Internet Explorer. Try RH click then “Pin to Taskbar”. It will now show in the Quick launch area at the bottom but have gone from the start menu. Try “Tools” cog icon on RHS. Try Zoom, you might prefer a different setting. Look at “Manage add-ons” Eg this is where you can change the default search engine. Note “Search in the address bar” is ticked. And ticking “Prevent programs from suggesting....” is a good idea.

Further reading All my course material is available on the local U3A website. u3a.org.uk/ under Course/Groups, Computing & I.T. Groups, CMP, Course Material, Computing (CMP) Downloads. u3a.org.uk/ Getting on the Web – Internet Explorer has much more detail. Searching the Web Word Document - About Search Engines.