Guide+to+Everyday+Computer+Issues

**Guide To Everyday Computer Issues**
by Anthony Wamble 11-30-09

First and foremost, do a quick visual **check to make sure everything is plugged in**. I know that sounds silly but even Bill Gates slipped a couple times forgot to check if his desktop computer was plugged in! Check both sides of the power cable and internet cable if you aren’t using the wireless. Below are some issues that often come up. It asks the question and then gives a few ideas to help solve it on your own. This will be a growing document so we can include more helpful tips so that you can learn and do it yourself! If all these fail, then call for help.

If you see that the program isn’t responding after a few seconds, you can “force quit” by hitting “Command+Option+Escape”. A window will pop up with current running programs, select the one that isn’t responding and click the “Force Quit” button. If you’re wondering if your work is saved, your answer is usually no. Try to get in the habit of periodically hitting “Command+S” or “File>Save” to keep your recent work updated on the document.
 * 1. How do I unfreeze a program?**

If the computer seems that it isn’t turning back on from sleeping or is on but nothing is responding, you need to hold down the power button for a few seconds until it turn off completely. Wait a few seconds, and then turn it back on. If it’s a desktop, you might try unplugging it for a few seconds as a last resort then plugging it back in and turning back on.
 * 2. How do I unfreeze a computer?**

To connect to the server, click on “Go>Connect to Server” from the menu on the top bar. If you are in a program, you won’t see this. You must hide the program or click on the desktop to get the Finder menu. The Finder icon (blue/white square faces) should be located on the dock bar at the bottom of the desktop. The server address, if it isn’t there already, is 10.10.2.11, click connect. For the teacher server, user: ms, pswd: team05. Another way to connect to the same server is user: ccs, pswd: grades. Select the shared items folder and click the connect button. You are now connected to the server and the server folder icon is now on your desktop. All you have to do is click on the icon and you can browse the server folder.
 * 3. How do I connect to the teacher/student server?**

For the student folder on the server, click on “Go>Connect to Server” from the Finder menu, make sure it says 10.10.2.11 and click connect. Click “Guest” and connect. Select Student Folder from the list and click connect. That’s it! The server icon is on the desktop.

If you are in your room, connect the small side of the video adapter to your computer and the big side of the adapter to the VGA cable that goes to the wall. Plug the other end of the VGA cable to wall for the projector. Your computer will blank out for a couple seconds because it is recognizing another display. That is good! When your projector is on, make sure that it is set to video 1. You can find that button on your remote or you can click the source button on your projector. It doesn’t matter if the projector is on or off while connecting the computer. This also applies if you are setting up in the Fireside room.
 * 4. How do I connect the projector to the computer?**

If you are connecting to anywhere else, you can connect your computer directly to the projector. There is a spot on the side panel of the projector to connect the VGA cable. Make sure your plugs are in tight and make sure your computer and projector are getting power. Turn on the projector, and select your image from the input button on the top.

From the apple icon on the top left of the screen, select software update. A window will pop up to load the available updates. Once it’s done, click the install button on the bottom of the window, enter your password, click agree and it will download. It’s a great idea to restart the computer after the download is complete so the new updates can apply.
 * 5. How do I get the latest Apple software updates?**

Everyone is allowed a certain amount of space on the server. Connect to the Shared Items server (refer to #3) and create a folder that is labeled with your name on it. Once you have done that, just click on the folder you want to back up on your computer, go to the top menu and click “Edit>Copy”, open your server folder, go to the top menu and click “Edit>Paste”. That’s it! Now, a couple important notes. To make it easy on yourself, get in the habit of saving all your files to one master folder so you can always copy and paste that one folder and update your files on the server. For example, I save all my work in my documents folder on my computer. I can organize all the files in there as I need but they are all in the documents folder. When I’m ready to update my backup, which is usually once a month, I simply copy my documents folder and paste in my server folder. This is great because I know I’m saving everything I created which it’s in one spot AND I don’t create a bunch of duplicates of my files, which can cause me to get confused on which is the current file and it prevents me taking a lot of hard drive space!
 * 6. What’s the best way to back up my computer?**

Restart. A majority of problems that occur while you are using your computer can be fixed by rebooting. Applications sometimes don’t release memory like they should when they are finished. The end result is your computer locks up or acts really weird. When you reboot, memory registers are cleared and most everything is reset. This fixes a lot of problems.
 * 7. What do I do if the computer is acting weird or glitching?**

First find out the name of the printer you want to use. I’m not talking about the brand and name on the actual printer, but the name it was given on the network. If you know of someone who is printing to that printer you can ask them or you can ask Stan for the name. Once you have that, you can add it to your printer list on your computer. An easy way is to open any program, click “File>Print”. On the top of the window and shows your current printer, if any. Click on the pull out menu and select “Add Printer”. A new window will pop up and your computer starts to find printers that are on the network. Find the printer you want and click “Add” on the bottom of the window.
 * 8. How do I add a printer?**

If you are working on a document or the Internet, you can zoom in on any part of the screen to focus on a subject or to crop everything else you don’t want seen. Simply hold the control button on your keyboard, use two fingers on the mouse track pad to slide up and it will zoom in your screen. Once you are zoomed in, your zoom view will follow your mouse. To zoom back out, click on the control button again and slide your fingers down the mouse track pad and it will return back to normal view.
 * 9. Can I zoom in the screen?**

When there is a new update, admin will send an attachment with an email saying updated address book. To see if there is an attachment on an email, you can find an icon of a paperclip beside the heading. Save the file by clicking “Save Attachment” and let it download to your computer. Remember where you saved it. Make sure your mail program is closed. Open the Address Book program. If the icon for the address book program isn’t on your dock, double click on your Macintosh hard drive, click on the Applications folder and scroll to find Address Book and click to open. Once it’s open, go to “File>Import>LDIF”. Browse to find your file and click ok. Close the program and now you are ready to use the new addresses!
 * 10. How do I update my Address Book on my Email program?**

When you drag it to the trash, it’s still on your hard drive but isn’t able to be used until it gets dragged out of your recycle bin. If you are sure you don’t need anything in the trash I would recommend emptying the trash bin to free up hard drive space. If something gets deleted by accident, simply drag out of the trash bin and put it back where it’s supposed to go on the hard drive. If it’s a file, put it in the documents folder. If it’s a program, put it in the Applications folder.
 * 11. If I drag something to the trash, is it permanently deleted?**

The top row of the keyboard has the options for adjusting your volume and brightness. There are two buttons to toggle up and down for each. The icon for brightness looks like a sun. The icon for volume looks like a cone speaker.
 * 12. How do I adjust the volume and brightness?**

Double click on the Macintosh Hard Drive, click on the Applications Folder. Scroll to find the program. Carefully drag the icon to the dock and let go and it will create a shortcut icon. When you want to get rid of a shortcut on the dock, click on the icon and drag it up to the desktop and let go and you will see a little cloud animation showing it’s deleted.
 * 13. How do I make a shortcut for a program I use often?**