Tech Tips
How to Securely Shop Online
How to enlarge the type on a web site.
What to do if an email link doesn't work.
How to forward email.
Tips for using an online form.
How to attach a document or picture to an email.
Current estimates state that in 1998, online commerce - the buying and selling of goods and services over the Internet - exceeded $37.5 billion in sales. But is shopping online safe? Can someone steal your credit card information? Will you really receive what you paid for? These are some of the questions online consumers are asking. The answers to these questions depend largely on who you do business with.
If you think about it, shopping with a credit card always presents some risks. For instance, what is to stop a telemarketer who takes orders over the phone, or the cashier at the Mall from stealing your card number and purchasing items with it.
Let's take a moment to review the reasons why using your credit card over the Internet is just as safe as - if not safer than - giving your number to a catalog order desk over the telephone? Check out the following list:
- Reputable online merchants use secure Web servers to scramble or encrypt all sensitive information to and from their Web sites.
- Merchant-to-bank information uses public-key encryption methods to additionally secure the information and establish the identity of the parties involved.
- You're legally protected in the United States by the same Federal laws that protect mail and telephone orders.
In general, online shopping is safe if you follow a few guidelines.
A secure Web server is one that uses a special type of computer communication know as SSL (short for Secure Socket Layer). You can tell that you're connected to a secure server by the symbols in your browser's status bar: Netscape Communicator uses a glowing locked padlock (also visible in the main toolbar as the Security button); Microsoft Internet Explorer also displays a locked padlock in the status bar and, if you pass your mouse over the symbol, it displays the type and level of encryption -- for example, SSL secured (40 bit).
When shopping online, use common sense and good judgement. Deal with reputable merchants whose names and brand names you are familiar with. Read each screen carefully as you proceed through the transaction. It's usually a good idea to write down order numbers and other important information, but most online ordering systems will automatically e-mail you a receipt or tell you to print one.
There are a number of settings that you can use to control how your PC and web browser deal with various security issues. The settings and options on your PC depend on which operating system and web browser you are using and are beyond the scope of this article. You should however understand these settings and review them. Use your operating system and web browser's Help features to learn more.
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You can enlarge the type on web sites in both Internet Explorer and Firefox browsers by holding down the Ctrl key while pressing the "+" button on the keyboard. You can reduce the size by holding down the Ctrl key while pressing the "-" key.
Contributed by Vince
You could send us an email directly from your email program using the address
feedback@thewebforseniors.com. Type or "copy and paste" the address into
a new email "To:" box.
If you are using Microsoft Outlook for email, you might want to be sure that
the Outlook program is set as the default email program for your computer.
Follow these steps:
- Open the Outlook program as you normally do to read your email
- Click the "Tools" item on the menu bar across the top of the window. A drop-down menu will appear.
- Click the "Options..." item in the drop-down menu. This will open a window with tabs to set different options.
- Click the "Other" tab in the options window.
- Look for a check box that says "Make Outlook the default program for E-mail, Contacts and Calendar."
- Put a check in the checkbox by pointing to it with the mouse and clicking the left mouse button or use the Tab key to highlight the check box and then press the space bar.
- Exit out of the options window by clicking the "OK" button.
These instructions are for most versions of Outlook though there may be some slight differences. If you are using a different email program such as Earthlink TotalAccess or Thunderbird, there should be a similar way to set it as the default email program. Someone who uses one of these programs could send us that information.
Once your email program is set as the default email program the email links in web sites should bring up your email program automatically.
Let us know if you have trouble and your question may appear in the Questions and Answers Department.
Do you really know how to forward e-mails? 50% of us do; 50% DO NOT.
Do you wonder why you get viruses or junk mail? Do you hate it? Every time you
forward an e-mail there is information left over from the people who got the
message before you, namely their e-mail addresses & names. As the messages
get forwarded along, the list of addresses builds, and builds, and builds, and
all it takes is for some poor sap to get a virus, and his or her computer can
send that virus to every E-mail address that has come across his computer. Or,
someone can take all of those addresses and sell them or send junk mail to them
in the hopes that you will go to the site and he will make five cents for each
hit. That's right, all of that inconvenience over a nickel! How do you stop it?
Well, there are two easy steps:
- When you forward an e-mail, DELETE all of the other addresses that appear
in the body of the message (at the top). That's right, DELETE them. High light
them and delete them, back-space them, cut them, whatever it is you know how to
do. It only takes a second. You MUST click the "Forward" button first
and then you will have full editing capabilities against the body and headers of
the message. If you don't click on "Forward" first, you won't be able
to edit the message at all.
- Remove any "FW:" in the subject line. You can re-name the subject
if you wish or even fix spelling.
Have you ever gotten an email that is a petition? It states a position and asks you to add your name and address and to forward it to 10 or 15 people or your entire address book. The email can be forwarded on and on and can collect thousands of names and email addresses. A FACT: The completed petition is actually worth a couple of bucks to a professional spammer because of the wealth of valid names and email addresses contained therein. If you want to support the petition, send it as your own personal letter to the intended recipient. Your position may carry more weight as a personal letter than a laundry list of names and email address on a petition.
So please, in the future, let's stop the junk mail and the viruses.
Contributed by Bill
Online forms aren't much different from paper forms but may look intimidating. You can use the Tab key to move through the fields of the form. You should not use the Enter key until you are ready to submit the form.
Fields that are required by the owners of the web site are usually marked with an apostrophe (*) and it is usually red.
Most fields will be text boxes to enter your name and address, etc. There may be a limit on the number of characters you can type.
A text box that has a scroll bar on the side is called a text area and is available for your comments or other free-form message. You can type in it without tabs or new lines. Depending on how the developer of the form set it up, it may or may not wrap your text automatically. If it doesn't wrap the text, there will be a scroll bar on the bottom of the box. You may use the Enter key in this box to create a new line. There may be a limit on the number of characters you can type.
Check boxes are the little boxes that you can put check marks in by pointing and clicking with your mouse. They have labels or text next to them to tell you what you are choosing. If there is more than one check box associated with a question or request, you can check as many of them as apply.
Radio buttons are the little circles you can put a dot in (select) by pointing and clicking with your mouse. They have labels or text next to them to tell you what you are choosing. If there is more than one radio button associated with a question or request, you can select only one of them. As soon as you click on another one, the previous one will become unselected, so be careful.
Some forms have a reset button that may be labeled something like "Reset" or "Clear Form." This should do exactly what it says so that when you click on it the form should be emptied of all your data and selections.
The submit button is usually labeled "Submit" but may have other labels such as "Submit your information", "Send your Information" or "Complete your purchase." If you press the Enter key at anytime while you are looking at a form (except in a text area box), it will activate the submit button and attempt to submit the information in the form. You submit the form by pressing the Enter key (be sure your cursor is not in a text area box) or clicking the submit button.
Which brings us to error messages. If you submit a form that does not have the required fields filled in or if the data is improper in some way, the form will probably be redisplayed with some error message either at the top or near the field that caused the error. Just fix the errors and submit the form again.
First, be sure you know in which folder the document (or picture) you want to send is. (Sometimes we save things and then don't remember where they went.) Documents of type .pdf, .txt, .doc or .rtf and picture files of type .bmp, .jpg, .gif, .png, etc. can be "attached" to emails. The following instructions are for Microsoft Outlook.
- Start a new email the way you usually do. You can go ahead and enter the person or persons you are sending it to and the subject and the text.
- Click on the "Insert" item in the tool bar and then select "File..." from the drop-down menu, or, if you see a paper clip in one of the toolbars at the top of the window, you can just click on that.
- You will then be able to browse your folders for the document or picture file.
- Click on the document or picture name and then click the button that says "Insert". You will see the name of the document or picture you selected added to the header of the email.
Other email programs should have similar methods of adding attachments.
You can attach more than one file to an email but be careful of how big the documents or pictures are as some email servers don't like to handle more than 1 or 2 megabytes per email.
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