Getting  Along With Your Computer Column Archive

Edit Photos Online and Watch A Walk In Space
By Cate Eales
Appeared August 16, 2007 on castanet.net

Online photo editing, space walking, and another Patch Tuesday. We're all over the place this week. Oh, yes, and please keep the Vista comments coming!


Easily Edit Photos Online
If you need a quick and easy way to edit your photos, and you don't have access to (or don't want to fuss with) a big, sophisticated photo editing program, take a look at Picnik, here. You can fix, crop, and otherwise tweak your photos, mostly with one or two clicks. There is nothing to download, and the service is free. If you're travelling and don't have access to your own photo editor, Picnik would be a way to get your photos in shape for sharing. The site links directly with Picasa on the web, Flickr, and with Facebook. You can email or even print directly from the Picnik site. As long as you can get online, you can use Picnik.
 

Live Space Coverage
Speaking of travelling, have you been watching the jaw-dropping NASA internet coverage of the Space Shuttle and International Space Station crews?  Shuttle mission STS-118 launched with Canadian Dafydd (Dave) Williams aboard last Thursday. The live NASA TV coverage is available here. From that page, you can choose to watch with RealPlayer, QuickTime, or WindowsMedia Player.

It was fascinating to listen to the astronauts set up housekeeping, early in the mission.

Houston: We're trying to send something to your printer, and we can't see it on the network.
[Several minutes pass]
Astronaut: The printer was turned off for some reason. Go ahead and try it now.

Yikes! They have the same problem printing from 354 km away as I have printing from here to my husband's printer.

There are cameras throughout the Shuttle and the Space Station, and during the space walks, the outside cameras provide absolutely stunning coverage of the space walkers. Last Saturday, I watched Williams and Rick Mastracchio use power tools to install a platform on the Station. They both had cameras in their helmets.

If you'd like to track the Shuttle and Space Station to see when they're over Kelowna, you can do that at the Human Space Flight website, here.

To find out when the Shuttle or Space Station will be visible any place on earth, use the Input tab and enter the information. I can see the vehicles clearly from the bottom of my driveway most evenings between 8:30 and 10:30.


Windows Updates
Back here on earth, Microsoft released updates this week to fix a dozen or so security flaws. Not everybody needs all of them, but all of us need some of them, whether we're using Vista or XP. Make sure your automatic update is turned on, or browse on over to Microsoft Update, here. If you have Office 2000, your Office Updates are not automatic, and you'll need to visit the Office site, here, to get them.

Also, if you're using Norton security products, please be sure your Live Update is working. There are two patches for some Norton security products. Honestly, what ever anti-virus and firewall products you are running, please be sure they are up-to-date!


Vista Follow Up
I received lots of email after last week's Vista column, and a future column will go into more detail. I love hearing from all of you with questions, comments, and suggestions. Please keep them coming to cate@rlis.com. I would still like to know whether you've made the switch to Vista, and why or why not. If you have, what do you like about Vista? What do you miss, if anything, about XP?

So far I've heard from people who have switched and liked it, who have switched and didn't like it so much, and from people not ready to make the switch yet. Oh yes, and from a Macintosh evangelist!

Rumour now has it that Service Pack 1 for Vista and Service Pack 3 for XP will be released at the same time, late this year or early next. It's just a rumour; no hard information is available on the date(s), or even on just what will be included.

What's included in the "Getting Along With Your Computer" column archives? Not surprisingly, all the past columns. You can look through the archives at any time by pointing your browser here. If you'd like to subscribe to this column by email, please visit this link.  It's easy, and free. If you'd prefer the RSS Feed, click here. See you next week!


Links
NASA TV http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/index.html
Human Space Flight tracker http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/SSapplications/Post/JavaSSOP/JavaSSOP.html
Picnik online photo editor http://www.picnik.com/
Picasa Web Albums http://picasa.google.com/web/learn_more_picasa.html
Flickr http://www.flickr.com/
Facebook http://www.facebook.com/
How to update your computer automatically http://www.microsoft.com/protect/computer/updates/automatic.mspx
Microsoft Update http://update.microsoft.com/
Microsoft Office http://office.microsoft.com/
Get Cate's column by email http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=20618
RSS Feed: http://rlis.com/rlis.xml
Cate's list of good, free software http://rlis.com/columns/column75list.htm

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Cate Eales has been helping people make online computing safe, accessible and fun for over 20 years. She lives in Kelowna with her husband, Eric, and her dog, Sandy. Cate is a partner in Real Life Internet Solutions, helping individuals and small businesses with virus, spyware and malware eradication; personal computer training and management; digital image management; music transfer; and website design, hosting and management. Email Cate at cate@rlis.com with your comments, suggestions, or questions. To browse the column archives, visit the Real Life Internet Solutions website at www.rlis.com.