TQT: New Fonts…

The internet can be a scary place. The most terrifying thing you can do is type the word “free” into Google. An excellent example is if you want a few font on your computer and you end up searching for “free fonts”. There is an excellent chance that if you proceeded to the resulting links, you would probably end up with at least one virus on your computer.

Last week, I needed a cool font for a project I’ve been working on, so I did some research for a great place to get fonts that wouldn’t damage my computer. Here’s what I found: dafont.com.

From dafont.com, you can easily search for free fonts, fonts that require a donation to use, or even demo fonts that you can purchase. The search can also filter for styles (gothic, fancy), effects (distorted, metallic), or even dingbats which are just symbols and pictures. I ended up finding exactly what I wanted: an old-school typewriter font.

What do you think of the results?

I also want to include a little warning. If you end up downloading new fonts and using them in a shared document, the person you’re sharing with may not be able to view the font unless they have it install. However, they will be able to see it if the document is first printed as a PDF or saved as a picture, like mine above is. Otherwise, you will have to “embed” the font in the document (check out this article for more info).

If you do find a font you like, it is simple to install and every page on dafont.com give instructions that look like this:

• Windows 7/Vista: Right-click on the font files > “Install”
• Windows XP: Put the font files into C:\Windows\Fonts
• Mac OS X: Double-click the font file > “Install font” button.

Let me know if you find any great fonts out there as I’d love to have some other great fonts to use on various projects I work on from time to time. Also, if you have a go-to site for fonts, stock images, or other design elements, feel free to share with the other readers.

TQT: Queue YouTube to a Specific Time…

Ever have a long YouTube video that you want to share with others, but the good part is at the end? Well here is a nice little fix for you.

Since I gave my iPad the boot last week, I thought it was only fitting to demonstrate this technique with a Blendtec video of an iPad getting bent in half, shoved in an industrial blender, and pulverized into a powder.

The link for the video usually looks like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAl28d6tbko

If you click that link, you will end up watching entire 1 minute and 40 second clip. It’s very entertaining and you should definitely watch it.

If you want to get straight to the good stuff, you would want to start the video at the 55 second mark. You can easily have YouTube do that for you by adding the following to the end of the link:

#t=0m55s

You can modify the 0 and the 55 to whatever you want. The final link will then look like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAl28d6tbko#t=0m55s

Bam! iPad demolished!

If you want to watch another cool video starring The Digitante In Action!, check out the video below. If it doesn’t show up, click here to watch it at the YouTube site.

http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/JC5Qyqy7Pyg&hl=en_US&fs=1&color1=0x5d1719&color2=0xcd311b

TQT: iPod charging…

Since Tuesday came and went without a post (actually, this entire week came and went without a post), I figured I’d try and squeeze in a Thursday Quick Tip. Let’s just say you are lucky there are two days that begin with the letter T.

Tonight’s tip refers to charging an iPod, but this advice is equally applicable to many of your electronic devices, especially your phone. The USB port on your computer can not only be used to transfer data to your mobile device, but it can also be used to charge your mobile device.

When I’m traveling, I like to do everything I can to not have to check a bag. This inevitably leads to me cutting back on as much stuff as possible. To do that, I generally take a USB cord and simply plug my cell phone or iPod into the USB port of my computer to charge. This saves me from having to take a cord with a big bulky plug with me.

Additionally, there has been a movement in the last year or so to standardize the charging ports for cellphones and other devices to use a connector called micro-USB. The beautiful thing about that is instead of taking a cord for your cellphone, a cord for your camera, a cord for your wife’s phone, etc, you will be able to just bring one cord and charge all your devices. Convenient!

Got your own tips on how to charge various devices or how to pack lighter for a trip? Let me know in the comments!

Thursday Quick Tip: Unclaimed Property…

One of the best feelings is to put on your winter coat for the first time in late fall, reach in the pocket, and pull out a $20 bill that you had completely forgot about. How would it feel to replicate that feeling any time of the year?

Well, short of lining the pockets of all your clothes with $20 bills, you might try searching for your unclaimed property.

What is unclaimed property? The term “property” can be slightly misleading since it does NOT include real property like houses and cars. It does include financial property such as abandoned bank accounts or refund checks. It also includes some other odds and ends such as collector coins, stamps, and other items that can be left in a safe deposit box.

How does it become unclaimed? Well, if you moved and canceled your homeowners insurance but forgot to leave a forwarding address, then the company can’t just toss the check out. It must turn it over to the state as unclaimed property. Another example, if a relative dies, you may not know about all their accounts. These hidden or unknown accounts would still be a part of the deceased’s estate. Finally, maybe you just forgot you had those Mickey Mouse wooden nickels that are now worth 6 cents stashed away in your safe deposit box. You may want them back, right?

How do you find out whether you have unclaimed property? The easiest way is to head to Google and type in the name of your state and the phrase ‘unclaimed property’. Since the Digitante HQ is in Indiana, that is what I searched for:

That search leads to Indiana Unclaimed, a simple site that has a box to search for first name and last name, or business name. Personally, I didn’t have any unclaimed property in any of the states I’ve lived in (Iowa, Indiana, Colorado, Illinois, Washington). However, I did find over $100 in refunded insurance premiums for my parents and almost $250 in refunded insurance premium for my brother. Not too shabby!

Alright, get going on that treasure hunt! Be sure to let me know what you find in the comments. And remember, my cut is 10%!

Tuesday Quick Tips: Alt Key…

Over the past couple of weeks of posting my Tuesday Quick Tips, I’ve actually be learning a ton of stuff. I would encourage you to head back to the past postings and check out the comments for each. A couple of weeks back, my buddy Eddie pointed out that the middle-click tip was perfect for closing non-focused Internet Explorer tabs since they don’t have a little x on them to close them. Excellent tip and one that never crossed my mind.

The tip for tonight is the use of the Alt key. You may have noticed little underlined letters in the menu bar of your programs. In Firefox, it looks something like this:

If you hold down the Alt key and then press the ‘T’ key, you will notice the Tool menu opens. Once that menu is opened, you will notice even more menu items with underlines. ‘D’ for Download, ‘S’ for Google Search, ‘O’ for Options, etc. By continuing to hold down Alt, you can keep pressing the letter key corresponding with the shortcut. Clicking Tools, then options with your mouse requires navigating a mouse and clicking.

These types of navigational maneuvers with a mouse might seem like they are fairly simple, but most tasks performed with a mouse are much slower than their keyboard counterparts. Check this non-scientific study that I did on the use of the Ctrl key in copying and pasting information.

As an added bonus, if you use the ribbon located in Microsoft Office 2007, holding down the Alt key shows an overlay of shortcuts for all the commands you could ever need.

What do you use your Alt key for? Are you a keyboard short-cutter or a mouse-only type? Let me know in the comments.

Tuesday Quick Tips: Middle Click…

If you’ve ever used a mouse, you pretty quickly notice there is a left mouse button which you can use to click, double click, and hold down to drag things around. The right button brings up a little menu called the context menu that has commands that you can use to perform available actions such as copy and paste, create a new folder, and look at the properties of various items. Finally, there is a scroll wheel that allows you to, well, scroll around on web pages and documents.

What you may not realize is that the scroll wheel also has the ability to click! You may have to investigate what it does in various circumstances, but here are a couple things for you to try out:

1. When browsing the web, click the scroll wheel on a link. You will notice that link opens in a separate tab or window in the background leaving your current page available to continue using. Most of the links on my site will open in a separate tab or window, however, they open immediately, taking you away from whatever you were reading. This is especially helpful for things like Friday Night Links. Try scroll wheel clicking each link, then you can go read them after you’ve read all my commentary!
2. Open up a PDF document (try it on a Form 1040 in honor of tax season). If you scroll wheel click on the PDF, you will see a circle with some arrows pop up. If you move the mouse, it will pan around the PDF. It makes for nice fluid navigation of PDF documents.

Now that you are armed with these tips, try scroll wheel clicking in other programs. Let me know if you find any other secret middle clicking secrets in the comments!

Tuesday Quick Tips: Google Calculate…

Carrying a calculator around with you isn’t very practical, unless you are Mrs. Digitante, then you have one in your purse. Your computer has a calculator, but you have to dig about three menus deep to find it. Fortunately, most people have a browser with a calculator built right in.

Not only does Google’s search box do calculations, but it will show you the answer in auto-complete before you are even done. Check it out in action:

As you can see, it reveals the answer of 46,656 as you type. Pressing enter isn’t really necessary. However, if you do press enter, you get more options.

If you wanted to actually search for the term 6^6, you are certainly given the option to do so.

Anybody use Google as a units converter as well? Got any other quick and easy ways to make calculations on the fly such as an abacus or your brain? Let everybody know in the comments.

Tuesday Quick Tip: Delete Autofills…

We’ve all done it: you visit your favorite site and misspell your login name. Uh-oh, now you are stuck with a misspelled autofill entry for the rest of your life, right? Wrong!

Who’s Teh Digitante? My evil twin brother perhaps? Hardly. He’s just a phantom that we can easily make go away with a couple of keystrokes:

• Type the first letter of the username so the autofill pops up, as above.
• Scroll down to the misspelled username.
• While it is highlighted, press the delete key. If that doesn’t happen to work, you can try holding the Ctrl key and pressing delete or holding the Shift key and pressing delete. The plain ol’ delete key seemed to work in all the situations I tried it in.

The entry should permanently be gone. This also works on any other autofill field such as if you move to a new address and you want to banish your old address. Or perhaps you are embarrassed that someone might see that you were searching for Britney Spears lyrics in the search box in the upper right corner of your browser.

Using someone else’s computer? Delete YOUR username from their computer when you are done logging in. Someone else using your computer. Delete THEIR username from your computer as well.

Is this the first time you’ve ever heard of this trick? Know of some other ways to go about this? Know of any way to edit existing autofill entries? Share in the comments!

Tuesday Quick Tip: Lock De-icing…

The weather around these parts has been a mess lately: three snowstorms yielding 6″ or more each in the last month. It has wreaked havoc on our street since we are a low-traffic, one way street, so the city never plows it. Fortunately, we’ve been able to get out and about.

Last night we were at Costco buying things in bulk and we swung by the gas station. While I was filling up gas, I noticed a guy having some major issues with trying to fill up his gas tank. The fuel tank door had frozen shut and wouldn’t budget. Fortunately, I had a solution.

My germaphobic self busted out a little bottle of hand sanitizer that had been hanging out in my pocket and rescuing me from grubby public elevators buttons, handrails, and doorknobs. The 62% alcohol in the hand sanitizer not only kill germs but it has a freezing point of well below freezing (almost -100°F).

After squirting some of the sanitizer in the crevice around the fuel door, it popped right open. The same technique will work on frozen locks; just squirt some hand sanitizer on your key, push it in the lock, and wiggle it around. You may need to repeat a time or two, but it should free up the lock.

A couple more related tips:

• If you have a mouse scroll wheel that gets stuck or doesn’t always register, squirting some hand sanitizer on it and spinning it should loosen up any gunk that is effecting the ability to scroll.
• If you regularly have ice on the windshield of your car and are having trouble scraping it, you can place a spray or squirt bottle in the trunk of your car and fill it with rubbing alcohol. After brushing any accumulated snow off, spray or squirt the alcohol on the windshield and let it soak before hitting it with the ice scraper. It should be much easier to break up.

Got any tips of your own related to the cold weather? How about tips related to alcohol? Drink recipes are welcome!

Tuesday Quick Tip: Keyboard Cleaning…

I’m embarrassed to say this, but tonight’s keyboard cleaning tips took me years and years to figure out, yet it’s ridiculously easy to do. I should have figured this out long, long ago.

The first part is cleaning crumbs out from the inside. The automatic first move here is to grab a can of compressed air, but that would be the wrong move. Next thing you know, you are going to have everything from dust bunnies to chunks of old sandwich flying straight out of the keyboard and all over your work area. A better solution is to grab one end of the keyboard and lift it so it is vertically on its side. Then you lightly tap it on the table or desk. All the dust and dirt should tumble in to a nice little pile. You can then brush it straight into a trashcan.

The second task is wiping down the keys. Eventually, the grub from your finger tips begins to stack up. If your try to just wipe down keyboard between projects, you are going to end up with either with loud beeping as too many buttons are pushed at once or you will accidentally delete that novel you have been writing since the fifth grade. I’m sure all 15 pages will be missed.

Make things easier on yourself by first shutting down your computer THEN you can scrub away. This goes the same for most computer cleaning chores: cleaning fans and vents, cleaning mice and keyboards, and wiping down the case itself.

Got any other tips for cleaning up your keyboard or your computer in general? Toss them in the comments.