Blizzard Nemo has arrived

Blizzard Nemo has begun his visit... and hopefully he'll move out to sea quickly..

So stay off the roads - enjoy a good book or movie and keep warm... Gov. Patrick declared a state of emergency as of noon today & banned all unauthorized vehicles off the roads at 4pm.

Predictions are blizzard NEMO will be more than the state has ever seen - possibly 3+ feet of snow - let's hope all the weathermen are wrong this time!!! and we get a lot less...

They are also warning that violators on the roads, who are not authorized, could receive fines of up to $500 plus a year in prison.. 

FYI: Anchorage Alaska's largest storm was 28 inches on December 23, 2003 - So be careful....and for those of you who consider shoveling - be very very careful...

Although our new series is due to begin next week, starting on Monday, February 11th, remember that our classes follow any school closures for bad weather, so if Quincy or Weymouth schools are closed - no classes will be held at Southern Artery or Union Tower...  And of course we will also post it here on our blog... 

Have a safe weekend...

Follow the storm and related information at these websites...

www.weather.com
www.accuweather.com
www.wcvb.com
www.whdh.com
www.wbz.com

Registration for new series #57- Tomorrow, Feb. 5th 9am

Just a quick reminder that Southern Artery is hosting registration tomorrow morning, February 5th beginning at 9am for the next new series #57 of computer classes that begin during the next two weeks......

Afternoon classes begin next Monday February 11th - topics will be::

·        Email changes including how to customize your email & using your contacts to the full extent;

·        Windows Explorer Filing Tips;

·        What's new in Cameras;

·        Scanning with Picasa;

·        Using Picasa Options & new features;

·        How to Upload Photos to Facebook, Google Drive, emails;

·        Google Earth & more

·        Internet movie streaming and

·        Word Basic Reviews...

Morning classes begin the following week, Monday February 18th - topics, days & times are:

·        Beginners: held Monday 9am-10:30am & Wednesday, 10:30am-12Noon

·        Intermediate 1/Internet: held Monday 10:30am-12N and Wednesday, 9am-10:30am

·        Intermediate 2/Word & Excel Basics: held Tuesday, 9am-10:30am

Student in the afternoon classes are welcome to sign up for one of the morning classes if they would like - but only if there is room ..

As always if you have topic suggestions for our next series - we'd love to hear from you..  We look forward to working with all of you and encourage you to bring a friend along, so we can ensure to keep each and every class full and continue this wonderful program...

Helpful Travel Tips

Just a few helpful travel tips .

BOOK AIRLINE TRAVEL from 12:01AM WEDNESDAY MORNING (Eastern Standard Time) on; all new fares are announced/posted at midnight Tuesday evening for the next week

SIGN-UP FOR ALL E-MAIL NOTICES of special prices from low cost airlines that serve your city or target destination (or are near-by).   Examples include: Kayak's FareAlert, Southwest Ding! Fares, Southwest Click 'n Save fares, AirTran, Frontier, JetBlue, Spirit Airline Red Light fares.  The low cost airlines' special fares are much less restrictive than the high cost carriers' week-end specials.  You can get a weekly summary of many of the airlines weekend specials at SmarterTravel.com. 

LAST MINUTE TRAVEL – Are you retired, a student off for the summer or can take time off from your job on short notice – then register with various “last minute travel sites” who offer incredible deals for short 3 or 4 days vacations to even longer 14-21 vacation land and or cruise packages – Why??  Arrangements are made & once that ship sails or hotel night passes the revenues can’t be made up, so they’d rather sell the package cheap, knowing you’ll spend money on liquor, side trips, gambling & other amenities…  Some incredible deals if you can leave on a few days notice

CONFIRM ARRANGEMENTS. If transportation and hotel are included in the travel package, ask how to contact those companies and confirm with them directly that the reservations have been made.  Always be sure to print off confirmations and keep a print copy with your folder or send yourself an email with the info..(with being able to sync phones & emails & claendars today it's easier than ever to access this info)

EMAIL YOURSELF ALL PERTINENT INFO: Send yourself an email including all airline info; hotel & car rental info & confirmation #'s an rates quoted; list of credit cards you are taking and their pertinent info - #'s, type, exp date, sc code, bank tele #'s; list of all your medications & dosages; doctors names etc... Today no matter where you go you will find a computer so that you can access this data in a pinch..

If you have a suggestion that might be helpful to others when they are travelling, we'd love to hear it...

What is an "Android" ?

We hear about Android Tablets & Android Smartphones all the time, but what is Android?

According to Wikipedia, "Android is a Linux-based operating system designed primarily for touch screen mobile devices such as Smartphone's and tablet computers. Initially developed by Android, Inc., which Google backed financially and later purchased in 2005, Android was unveiled in 2007 along with the founding of the Open Handset Alliance: a consortium of hardware, software, and telecommunication companies devoted to advancing open standards for mobile devices. The first Android-powered phone was sold in October 2008.

Android is open source and Google releases the code under the Apache License. This open source code and permissive licensing allows the software to be freely modified and distributed by device manufacturers, wireless carriers and enthusiast developers. Additionally, Android has a large community of developers writing applications ("apps") that extend the functionality of devices, written primarily in a customized version of the Java programming language. In October 2012, there were approximately 700,000 apps available for Android, and the estimated number of applications downloaded from Google Play, Android's primary app store, was 25 billion.

These factors have allowed Android to become the world's most widely used smartphone platform and the software of choice for technology companies who require a low-cost, customizable, lightweight operating system for high tech devices without developing one from scratch. As a result, despite being primarily designed for phones and tablets, it has seen additional applications on televisions, games consoles and other electronics. Android's open nature has further encouraged a large community of developers and enthusiasts to use the open source code as a foundation for community-driven projects, which add new features for advanced users or bring Android to devices which were officially released running other operating systems."

Happy New Year

Happy New Year to you and your family and we hope you all had a wonderful holiday season.  

I want to apologize for the lack of postings the last several weeks - in addition to the normal hustle and bustle of the holidays, I had some major back issues.  So while I was in Boston for the holidays, I finally said "uncle" and gave in and had a necessary medical procedure on my back.  As a result, and much to my dismay, I was unable to spend anytime on the computer (not an easy task for me) as most of you can imagine.....

But I'm pleased to say that I am finally feeling better and look forward to getting back to blogging and teaching...

We hope you will enjoy this little break and we look forward to seeing all of you who are currently taking classes - back when classes resume next week - and it will be week 7 of the current series...

For those of you who are planning to take the next series that will begin the week of February 11th and continue into May (with breaks in February and April during school vacations)..  Registration for the new series will be held at the SA Offices one month from today on Monday, February 4th, so mark your calendars.. 

So enjoy the "refreshing" weather and stay warm... and if you have a topic for our blog or for a class that we should do, I'd love to hear from you...so email me anytime: cherie_houston@hotmail.com

Basic Music Terminology

Basic Music Terminology ...

There is some terminology that you probably need to be aware of as you learn to use music on your computer or any digital device...

·        MP3* - a file format used for compressing audio files to roughly 1/12th their original size.

·        RIPPING - Basically this is the function of  ”copying” your files  – in this case a music album and individual song tracks onto your computer’s hard drive (this is also known as encoding)

·        MEDIA PLAYER - an application that is used to play all types of media (music, video radio, etc.). Windows Media Player, iTunes, VLC. RealPlayer and QuickTime are all examples of media players.

·        BURN – Basically this is the function of ”pasting” your file – in this case music – onto the CD and or DVD. 

*Note: When we save to MP3 format, you typically won’t notice any reduction in sound quality, but , if you want to ensure you have the highest quality you should import the music again from the original source with the original format, and then make a copy and convert the copy to mp3 formatting. 

What is a "Read It Later" service?

Whether you use your computer, tablet, laptop, eReader or other mobile device - such as a Smartphone or iPhone to "surf the web" we all have the opportunity to read numerous articles, watch videos and other information from friends & family on Facebook, Twitter or maybe Pinterest; or you get News Feeds from your favorite media websites... BUT you don't have time to read or view them all now..  

That's how a "Read it later" service or app can help.  These "apps" saves the information - link - etc. so you can view the article, photo, video later at your convenience (yes-this is also cloud computing).  So with thee services, you establish an account, meaning you have to have a username & password and that allows you to access "your account" and whatever you've saved... 

Many of these services are free (including my 2 personal favorites) but some are not - but they all allow us to  manage articles and other media that we want to access later...  Apps for these services can be downloaded to your computer, tablet or other mobile device and they are very very easy to use..... 

If you have a Pinterest or Twitter account they also offer this service and Facebook will offer it very soon....

I've been playing with 2 different services and really like them both - and yes, both are free

Evernote is my personal top choice abs quite honestly the one I now use daily, because I can store anything I want to remember including quick reminder notes (my family and associates will tell you I'm a constant list maker so this is great for me), but I can save anything I want to view or read later.. www.evernote.com

Pocket (formerly known as Read it Later) is my 2nd favorite and worked wonderfully.... www.getpocket.com

Others you may want to check out...

Instapaper, website is:  www.instapaper.com - Free and paid versions

SnipIt, website is: www.snip.it/#welcome - Free 

Side note... For those of you with tablets and other "Android based devices" some of my students in Arizona are loving this new free app - called "CRACKLE" which is a totally legitimate app offering free streaming of TV shows and movies.  I found that it doesn't have all TV shows, but there are lots of old favorites and some of the new ones as well; same goes for movies...  But again, it's free so a great way to play with "streaming" before you move on to one of the paid services, such as Netflick or HBO... so you might want to give it a try... I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the picture...  I don't think this available for Apple devices yet, but keep checking back - no doubt it will be...

 

Check it out: www.crackle.com