Computer Tips This month we will cover some of the interesting settings vou can adjust on your machine to make it more your own. There are many alterations you can make and if you follow these instructions you can gain control in no time. Changing your desktop: In windows, you can choose the picture you would like as your background quite easily. Go to [START] "Settings" "Control Panel" "Display" "Background" (Wallpaper), select the picture you want - and click [OK]. If you want to use a picture that you have downloaded or taken with a digital camera than please save it as a .bmp picture to save yourself some hassles, Changing your homepage: The Homepage is the first web page that your browser loads when you start the pro- gram, a lot of people set their homepage to the page where they get their emails, or a page they use very regularly, such as Google. Open Internet Explorer. Surf to the web- page you want. Click on TOOLS at the top of the screen as shown to the left, then click on INTERNET OP- TIONS. Next you will see the Internet Options dialogue box as shown on the left, type in the address of the home- page or if it is the one you are currently visiting just click Use Current. Then simply click on the OK button. Using a signature with Outlook Express: You can create a signature that is sent with every email you send. Open Outlook Express. Select Tools | Options... from the menu in Outlook Express. Go to the Signatures tab. Click New. Type the text of your signature under Edit Signature. Try to limit your signature to 4-5 lines of text, and possibly use the standard signature delimiter. Once you are done simply click OK and voila, a new signature at the bottom of all of your emails. How to Compose a Message Using Stationery: To com- pose a message using stationery, follow these steps: On the Compose menu, click New Message Using, and then chek the stationery design you want to use. In Outlook Ex- press 5, click New Message Using on the Message menu, and then click the stationery design you want. If the sta- tionery design you want to use is not on the list, click More Stationery to view more stationery designs. Address and compose your message, and then click Send. How te Configure Default Stationery: To configure Out- look Express to open all new messages with a default sta- tionery type, follow these steps: On the Tools menu, click Stationery. In Outlook Express 5, click Option on the Tools menu, click the Compose tab, and then click Station- ery. Click the Mail tab to configure the default Mail sta- tionery, or click the News tab to configure the default News stationery. Under When Composing New Messages Use, click This Stationery, and then click Select to choose your default stationery type. Click OK, and then click OK. How to Create Custom Stationery: Copy the gif or jpg graphic file that you want to use as the stationery back- ground into the stationery folder. By default, the stationery folder is Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared \Stationery. Press and hold down the SHIFT key while you right-click an htm file in the stationery folder, click Open With, and then click Notepad. On the File menu, click Save As. Type the mame of the graphic file you copied into the stationery folder in the File Name box, add "tm" (without quotation marks) as the extension, and then click OK. For example, if the file is named Flower jpg, type "Flower. htm" in the File Name box. Modify the HTML code in the htm file so that it uses the .gif or jpg file as the background graphic. Quit Notepad. And finally, we are always asked how to back up your set- tings such as your address book, favourites etc. Here are some simple instructions. Copy Mail Files to a Backup Folder: To make a backup copy of your Outlook Express e-mail message files: On the Tools menu, click Options. On the Maintenance tab, click Store Folder. Select the folder location, and then press Continued on page [2 Debug Computer Services (613) 476-8721 Open 9-5 Mon-Fri Ask for Pat or Steve debugcomputers@hotmail.com