Margins and Virtual Memory

How Far to the Margin?

Have you ever felt frustrated when working with MS Word's tabs? I mean, you're trying to set up your tab stops, but you're finding it difficult to ensure that they are placed properly between the margins.

You've got the ruler displayed (View menu, Ruler choice), but it's still a bit of a pain to double check that you've got it "just right." It's easy to get lost in all those eighth of an inch marks or the even more abundant millimeters.

So, the next time you find yourself in the old click, hold and drag routine to place your tab stops across the top ruler and you become frustrated with the placements, give this quick trick a try!

Before you click on the tab stop to move it, hold down the Alt key.

Yep, that's right. The whole trick is in the Alt key.

With just that one extra key, you'll turn your usual display of tab stops

What you have here is an obvious and easy to read placement guide for your tabs. (The tab stop clicked is 2.5" from the left margin and 4" from the right margin).

In place of the ruler, you'll be able to read the distance the tab's current position is from the left and right margins, which allows for an exact placement.

While holding the Alt key down, drag the tab stop back and forth across the ruler. You'll find that the measurements adjust to your every move.

No more getting lost trying to count the millimeters, centimeters or a fraction of an inch. With a quick tap of the Alt key, you'll have Word doing the measuring for you!

Your Ruler Preference

Do you use MS Word's ruler feature with your documents? (You know, View menu, Ruler choice).

Ever find yourself wishing it was in a different measurement unit? (Let's say it's in inches and you want it in centimeters). Or, maybe you weren't even using the ruler, because the way it measured just isn't the way you think in terms of distance.

Still wishing for that different ruler scale?

Your wish is Word's command!

Much to your relief, you can control the measurement units on the ruler with just a couple clicks.

• To start, you need to go to the Tools menu, Options choice.
• Now, you're looking for the General tab.
• At the bottom, you'll need to locate the "measurement units" field.
• Use the drop down list to select your measuring preference.
• Then click OK.

The ruler has been adjusted to your way of thinking

what virtual memory is?

Basically, virtual memory is non-physical memory (yeah, that helps, huh?!)

More so, Windows uses virtual memory when it doesn't have enough "regular" physical memory to perform a certain task. When it has to resort to that, Windows uses your hard drive to store information that would normally be put into your RAM memory. Here's a simplified example:

Let's say you have 32 MB of RAM available on your computer. Now, you load a program that takes up 20 MB and another that takes up 22 MB. For those two programs, you would need a total of 42 MB, but you only have 32 MB of actual RAM memory. However, both programs still run. What's happening?

Well, Windows is using 10 MB of your hard drive space to supplement your physical 32 MB of RAM (don't worry, that 10 MB will be erased once Windows is done with it).

Now, I know what you're probably thinking. Why bother adding extra RAM to your computer if it can use hard drive space instead? Well, the main reason is, RAM is much faster!

Whenever you're using a lot of virtual memory, you're slowing your computer down (way down). The best work around for that is to get more physical memory. I recommend 64 to 128 MB, depending on how many programs you usually run on your computer, simultaneously.

Oh, and one more thing: If you don't have a lot of hard drive space left (I recommend a minimum of 100 MB) and you're experiencing a lot of problems, the lack of virtual memory may be why. When Windows runs out of memory (virtual and non-virtual), it just doesn't run all that well. Alright, well, I hope this tip has helped all of you in understanding virtual memory a little bit better.

Add a Picture - Video Tip

Have you ever been browsing the Web and you find an awesome picture that you know you just have to share with one of your friends? I know that happens to me all the time. Either I find a cute picture of a dog (I love dogs!) or a beautiful picture of a flower and I just think of all the people I know who would enjoy it too. So, what do I do? Well, I of course, send the picture to them in an e-mail! It's so easy to do and it's such a great way to share the things you find online. Want to learn how to do this so you can start right away? I thought you might! Just click on the link to get started and have fun! http://imgsrv.worldstart.com/videotips/index.htm

Or, if you would just like to read today's tip, you can do that as well, here:
http://www.worldstart.com/tips/tips.php/866

This Web site is a fun diversion and a nice way to take a break during a stressful day. How does it work? Well, just press any key to start and then trail your mouse around the screen. (Note: This does require a Flash player, so if you don’t have one already, you can get one here for free). Magically, your mouse starts to make an ink trail that follows after your cursor!

You can even change the color of the ink by left clicking your mouse. If you let your mouse linger in one spot, you’ll notice that the ink gets thicker and if you leave it there long enough, you’ll have a big ink blob! Move your mouse around quickly and you’ll have a thin ribbon of ink. It's so cool!

What was the inspiration for this? Well, Jackson Pollock is. He was an abstract artist who lived from 1912 to 1956. You can learn more about him here. This site gives you the opportunity to try your hand at his style of painting.

All in all, it was a lot of fun to play around here. If you want to save your work, finish your art and then press the Print Screen button on your keyboard. Then you can paste it into the Paint program that comes with most computers nowadays. Then just save it or you could print it out. Either way, it's so much fun. Enjoy!

http://www.jacksonpollock.org/