Help - My Outlook message text is microscopic!

     We all do it occasionally – hit a few errant keys in just the right combination that we unintentionally mess something up on our computer.  We usually do it so fast that we have little idea of what we’ve really done, but if we’re lucky, we remember just enough to help get us back to where we want to be.

     The other day an exasperated client left a voicemail, “Help, I can’t send any emails.  The text is microscopic!”  She was using Outlook 2007.  I found out she could actually create a message and send it, but she just couldn’t really see what she was typing.  When I received a test email from her, it showed up in the correct font and size.

     I had her check the default message and reply fonts under Tools/Options/Mail Format /Stationery and Fonts/Personal Stationery tab settings ( http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook-help/change-the-default-font-or-text-color-for-e-mail-messages-HA010239585.aspx ).  They were all correct.  She remembered that “something happened” when she accidentally hit the ctrl key.

     A little internet research led me to a potential solution of opening a new message, placing the curser in the body and holding down the ctrl key while using the mouse scroll wheel to change the viewable text size ( http://www.msoutlook.info/question/67 ).  This worked for me, but my client uses a laptop with no mouse and therefore no scroll wheel.  I assume her laptop has some sort of mouse scroll function, but she did not know what it was. I figured there had to be an easier way.

     More research pointed me towards the solution I was looking for: Open Outlook 2007 application, click on a new or received email, click the "Format" tab. Click on the radio button corresponding to the percent size you want to "Zoom to" (http://www.ehow.com/how_6498234_change-zoom-outlook-2007.html).  Easy fix after all.

     We still don’t know what key combination she hit to change this in the first place, but knowing that it had something to do with the ctrl key led us to the solution.

Firefox 4 -- to upgrade or not to upgrade?

     Wow is the new Firefox fast! Boy, do I wish I would have checked the compatibility of my add-ons/extensions before I upgraded!

For example, I found out that the following applications that were not compatible:

     I was really bummed because I use some of the extensions, like LinkDiagnosis and Mozbar, quite extensively.  I felt like I needed to go back to version 3.6.  Apparently, a few other people felt this way as well: http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/questions/795075?s=go+back+to+previous+version&as=s

     Here’s how I was able to "roll back" to 3.6 (big thank you to "TonyE" for his post on the above forum :

     “I strongly advise against going back to Firefox 3.5, when you installed Firefox 4 it made changes to a couple of files that store user data, those files will no longer work in Firefox 3.5. If you go back to Firefox 3.5 the files containing bookmarks, history and cookies will be lost, causing you to lose all history and cookies, with bookmarks being restored from a backup.
If you want to downgrade it would be better going to Firefox 3.6.15.
To downgrade to Firefox 3.6.* you can uninstall Firefox 4, but do not select the option to "Remove my Firefox personal data". If you select that option it will delete your bookmarks, passwords and other user data.
You can then install Firefox 3.6.* available from http://www.mozilla.com - it will automatically use your current bookmarks, passwords etc.
To avoid possible problems with downgrading, I recommend going to your profile folder and deleting the following files if they exist - extensions.cache, extensions.rdf, extensions.ini, extensions.sqlite and localstore.rdf. Deleting these files will force Firefox to rebuild the list of installed extensions, checking their compatibility, and reset toolbar customizations.
For details of how to find your profile folder see https://support.mozilla.com/kb/Profiles “

Thanks to "mlwalker" in the same thread, I was able to find the download page for version 3.6:
http://www.oldapps.com/firefox.php?old_firefox=109
    
     Finally, after the reinstall of 3.6 I did have to reinstall HTML Validator, but by the time I was finishing this post I noticed that the LinkDiagnosis tool was upgraded to work with Firefox 4!  I haven’t tried it yet since I’m waiting for updates to the other tools I use.  Hmm, I wonder if the greater speed I initially experienced might have been due to fewer extensions being loaded?  Guess I’ll have to wait a little bit to find out.

Having Trouble Scanning From An HP All-In-One?

Can’t seem to use the control panel scan button to initiate a scan to you HP all-in-one?  Make sure you download and install the full printer installation package.

The other day I installed the software for an HP Officejet 6500 E709N on my laptop.  The wireless printing worked just fine, but when I tried to initiate a scan from the control panel on the all-in-one, the unit would not acknowledge my laptop as an attached device. 

When I tried to do this, I kept getting the following error: 'No Scan Options'.  I was a little perplexed since I was able to print, so I looked for the scanner under “Control Panel/Scanners and Cameras”.  I was able to communicate with the E709N from the laptop using the icon I found, but I could still not “see” the laptop from the scanner.

Online research informed me that I could try to initiate a scan from Microsoft Paint (I did not know one could scan from Paint – it works!), but I wanted to be able to initiate the scan from the all-in-one.  A little more digging around provided me with the final answer.  I had downloaded an installed only the basic drivers, but I really needed to install the full package so that I would have the necessary HP Solution Center software - http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c02450835&cc=us&lc=en&dl#N74

I downloaded and installed the full package.  The installation procedure prompted me to uninstall the previous software and required me to re-boot and start the installation process a second time, but I am now up and running.  Now I need to figure out how to be able to use the Solution Center application with multiple HP devices – initial research has not been promising.

 

Problems Installing Drupal 6.19 On GoDaddy

The other day I decided to install Drupal so I could see how it worked. I don’t have my own internet server and I didn’t want to go through the hassle of installing a local copy on my Windows Vista system using a Windows web server application like XAMPP or WAMP, so I decided to use one of my GoDaddy Linux hosting accounts instead

The installation procedure seemed simple enough, but I did run into a couple of snags that took a little of research and trial and error to solve.

When I went to the appropriate url to begin the actual Drupal setup on the GoDaddy server, I got a host error message instead of the Drupal installation script. Apparently, the GoDaddy install (https://hostingconnection.godaddy.com/Application/Drupal.aspx) did not load the /drupal/sites/default/default_settings.php file. I decided to download the Drupal files as though I was going to install the application on my desktop (http://drupal.org/project/drupal) so that I could try to manually copy the default_settings.php file to GoDaddy, but I didn’t realize that the GoDaddy install would not automatically grant me the permissions required to work with the /drupal/sites/default folder on the GoDaddy site.

After checking around for some online help for setting folder/file permissions in GoDaddy, I discovered that I had to go to the Control Center for my Linux hosting.  I tried adding full permissions but this was not allowed.  Finally, I decided to just add the Read and Execute permissions which then allowed me to add the write permission.  I was then able to copy the /drupal/sites/default/default_settings.php from my newly-downloaded Drupal files to the default folder in my GoDaddy database.

I still had one more task to perform before the installation script would run all the way through (this was not clear to me in the instructions).  Even though I found my GoDaddy MySQL user and database names (under products/hosting/databases/MySQL/Edit/View Details, it let me know that I had the right information, but it still didn’t work.  I finally discovered that I had to select the “Advanced” option ( http://drupal.org/documentation/install/run-script ) and change the host from “http://localhost” to the GoDaddy MySQL database path on the GoDaddy server.

Once I entered this information I was able to access the Drupal installation script on my site and I was able to continue.  After I completed this I removed the Write permission through the GoDaddy Control Center (see above).