Mastering Computers
These days, almost everyone does their writing on a computer. This has numerous advantages, but it's a whole new skill, and involves a host of frustrations.
Our W2P members must also deal with AOL and its unending foibles. These tutorials cover some of the basics.
I recommend the 'how to' title Writing With a Computer, by Joan P. Mitchell (©1989, Houghton Mifflin) It's a bit old, but the essential functions remain the same.
(Most of the newer "bloatware" word processing applications have so many bells and whistles it's ridiculous. Better to stick with simple and effective cyber-methods.)
Here are four useful books.|
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Cutting and Pasting text
Doing written critiques is a creative process. Our members find it helpful to work
directly with the text of the submission they are commenting upon. Also, this makes
the critiques more specific, thus far more useful to the receiver.
Doing so requires the "cutting and pasting" of email text. This is a simple
technical process that, once mastered, will prove useful in every aspect of computer
use, and in your writing career.
Cutting and pasting is one of the most basic functions of ALL computers, and of ANY
word processing, office, email, or other text-based software.
The reason you can't alter an email (you have received) is that it is secured as
a "hard version" of the document. Just think, you wouldn't want someone
to change an email you sent and then pass it off as yours. So, what you have to do
is copy the entire email into the text of a brand new one. To do this on most computers,
either you use the Edit menu to copy and paste, or the function keys on your keyboard.
Using keys:
On a PC you can Select All of the text to be copied by hitting
control and the letter "a" key. Then after all the text of the email is
highlighted -- usually in black or blue -- you Copy by hitting control and the letter
"c" key.
This will COPY everything that is highlighted. Go to the new email you are creating,
move the cursor there, and hit control and the letter "v" key. Now you
will have PASTED the entire text into the new email and can edit to your hearts content.
On a Mac computer it's the same, except instead of the Control key, use the Command
("apple symbol") key.
Using menus:
You can also do this with your mouse and the built-in AOL graphical
screens. Start up AOL, but don't log on yet. Look in your AOL 'menu bar' for the
Edit instruction area. Click and hold on that word. You will see that it has commands
listed (in a 'pull down' menu) under it, such as Select All, Copy, Cut, and Paste.
Use your computer mouse. Open up the email document you wish to critique. Hold the
clicker down (on a Windows machine, the left-clicker) and pass the cursor over some
text. You can see it getting dark in the background, or being 'highlighted.' On the
'original,' you have to either use Select All (as with a submission) or 'highlight'
the part you want to talk about.
Now use Copy. Just put your curson on top of that menu-word. That places the selected text into the computer's memory. On a Mac that's called the Clipboard.
Next, create a new email document. Just click Write on the main AOL menu. Or, with
AOL running, type command (or control) and "n." Leave the new email open.
Click on its text window (it will be blank) to put the curson there (instead of in
the 'address' window or 'subject' line.
Click on Paste, or type command/control and "p." The text you wanted will appear in the text area.
Saving documents:
Now use Save (or control -"s") to keep the document on your hard drive.
(Macs use their Command button instead.)
You should create some new folders for your documents.
Choose New Folder from your computer's main menu, or main document window (Windows or MacOS -- not AOL's). Or, click on your desktop (main computer screen), then type control and "n."
An empty new folder will appear. You can type in its name, and use the mouse to move it around, and even place it inside other folders. (They each need a unique name.) Save your old and new emails, and any other documents, within such a folder.
Getting Organized
Do not leave your emails jumbled up in your AOL Filing Cabinet,
or on your desktop!
We suggest making a fresh folder for each week's Writing to Publish activities. Place
those folders away from your AOL software folder. Perhaps create a main folder called
Writing, and put each new folder in there. That way, if AOL crashes, or you have
to reinstall it, your personal documents and emails will not vanish.
(By now, the group leader has more than 500 folders inside his
main W2P folder.)
Microsoft Word and many other word processing applications use an almost identical
process. Master this technique here, with AOL, and the rest of your computer will
become far more useful.
Especially for AOL users:
* You can banish much of that junk email you've been getting. Go to Keyword: MAIL CONTROLS (from your original, or 'master,' Screen Name).
Select your most-heavily-plagued screen name (and others, next,
if you wish), and set it to "Allow email only from AOL members and these addresses."
Then type in the addresses of any specific non-AOL sender you expect to be getting
email from.
* This will cut down your junk email to only those "Forged Address" emails
that appear to originate within (or even from) AOL, plus the countless short-lived
AOL accounts opened by spammers.
These usually advertize diets, porno, easy money, miracle cures, and other chintzy stuff--but will likely attempt to rip you off big time! If--and only if--you follow the hyperlink they always include, and thus launch your AOL browser,they will want your credit card info, and heaven help you if you give it to them. Some of them will even load a Trojan Horse program, or a virus, onto your computer, and rip off your screen names, passwords, and account information. The likely result is that AOL will have to shut down your account, at least temporarily.
* The only way to completely avoid junk email is to set AOL to allow email "only from" approved addresses. Then type (or paste) in everyone you can think of who sends you email. The drawback is that you'll miss any legitimate messages from sources you didn't list, and you must update the list every time you expect to get email from someone new.
Creating an Address Book
First, start up AOL. Open the email (or your W2P Named Log) with the current Active
Member's List in it. Select (only) that part of the text, by passing the cursor over
it, with the mouse button held down. The background will turn dark, so you can see
that it's being selected.
Then go to you computer's main menu (at the top of the screen, or wherever you keep
it), and click on Copy. Or use the proper keyboard strokes. (Mac and Windows computers
differ on this.)
Next, make sure AOL is on your computer desktop's active window. (That it's "in
front.")
Now go, by pointing and clicking, to your: AOL Menu >> Mail Center >> Address Book >> New Group.
When the New Group window opens, type in a name like Writing to Publish. Then
click on the window under it (or press Tab), and Paste in
the current Active Members List.
Lastly, click on Okay to Save the new group file. Then Quit
AOL. That saves it for sure; I've had problems, when a later
crash erased changes I thought I'd made . . .
From then on, when you want to send an email to the group, just create a new (blank)
email, and open your Address Book. There is a button for it on every email window!
Double click on the file you've created (called, Writing to Publish), and that entire
list will automatically appear in the Send
To window of your email!
To upgrade the List, as we must sometimes do, just follow the main steps above. Open
Address Book, but when you are looking at the file(s) there, select on Writing to
Publish (with one click), then click on the Edit button instead.
Then you can either Select and Clear the entire list, and Paste in a new one, or (as I do), simply remove, or type over, any screen
names that are to be added or subtracted. And, click Okay to Save it.
Have your AOL software up and running, and be "in" the Den already. Bring
your cursor (mouse) onto your AOL menu bar, and select My Files. Under this, go to Log Manager and click it. It'll show you System,
Chat, and Instant Message. In the Chat section, select New Log, and Save it to where you can find it again (another common error we see!),
most likely in the same special Folder you're using for your story's emailed critiques
and related stuff.
Just Close the
log after the session is over, and you'll have a complete record of all that is said
in the Den tonight. (This works for any other AOL chat you may visit.)
Make a test run if you wish, in any chat room at all. If this doesn't work for some
reason, mention it right away, and we'll talk you through it before the session gets
rolling.
Checking and Unsending AOL email
Here is a quick primer on what AOL can do for you, that most email servers cannot.
<< I've totally lost track of who I sent emails to. >>
AOL can show you, and with its normal, built in functions.
Just open your normal email window, then click on the Sent Mail tab. (The blue one
up top, near New Mail. (The Old Mail tab is also useful.)
In the Sent Mail window you will see which emails you have sent lately, including
the date, subject line, and receiver -- if to a group, the first one on that email
list.
<< I bumped the "Enter" button and sent that last note unfinished.
>>
Again, open the Sent Mail window. Look at the buttons underneath.
You can check on the Status on any email, and if no one has opened it yet, you can
Unsend it, too! Just click Unsend and AOL will grab it back.
I use that function all the time, either to catch a mistake, or, let's just say,
after I've calmed down. ;-)
The nearby Status window will show you who has opened, or not yet opened, or deleted, all the emails you've recently sent; and also, the group emails you've received.
There's more information on our FAQ page. (Even some alternates for the procedures explained here.)