Answer: Great question, Sarah. I have a rule of thumb that regular listeners will have heard before: a file doesn't exist until there are at least two copies. How you make that extra copy can be as simple as plugging in a USB thumb drive, right-click a file, point to send to and then click that new drive. Some programs, like Quickbooks, have a built-in backup function. Each version of Windows has its own backup function. Search the help and you'll find information on how to do backups. Be sure you understand the computer's file system before you try to do a backup because it doesn't do much good to backup a folder that doesn't have your information in it. Until you get to that understanding, you might want to just backup the whole computer. For that, you'll probably need an external USB hard drive or an Internet-based service. Both of these generally come with their own backup software to help keep your data safe. The quality of backups varies, and how you backup and restore the data can vary also, so I can't give much in the way of specifics, and you can find free backup software available on the web at home.vembu.com. We'll have a link in the show notes to this site.
Cool Site: Guitaryst.com: This week's site is for the guitar players in our audience. Guitaryst.com (spelled with a "y") is a site and an application that combines guitar tablatures with Internet music sites like last.fm so that you can learn to play the song along with the music. The song plays in the background and the tabs appear on the screen. You can search for songs and if they are in the site's tab database, then you're all set. There's not much else to do here, but if you're an aspiring guitarist, well, then that's probably enough. MakeUseOf reports that this site will make an iPad app available soon as well. Oh yes, and did I mention? It's free.
Cool Gadget: Microsoft Tactile Touchscreen: One of the biggest drawbacks to touchscreen keyboards is that they don't provide normal feedback when you press the buttons. Well, Microsoft has patented a new kind of touch sensitive screen that includes a layer of plastic that reacts to ultraviolet light. When one wavelength of light passes through the plastic, it stiffens. Another wavelength softens the same spot. This is called shape memory technology – the plastic remembers its former shape and under the right conditions can be coaxed into and out of that shape. Microsoft plans to use a modulated UV light to give texture to the touchscreen that matches the image beneath. This way you can type and really feel the keys. This is helpful, because without that, even touch typists have to look at the keyboard while they type.
It's All "Geek" To Me: Volume: This week's term is Volume. The most obvious usage refers to the loudness of sounds. But in computer jargon, Volume refers to a drive; a particular data storage device. That can be a hard drive, a USB attached drive, a specific compact disc, a tape, or a diskette if you still have one. The drives just have to be formatted so that the computer can read them. That's a volume: a disk, removable or not.
