Alvin's Educational Technology Blog

My computer gets rebooted the second Tuesday of each month.  That is the day Microsoft sends out updates and patches.  Installation of those files usually requires a reboot.  Other than that, I don’t turn my computer off.

There has been a long debate concerning leaving a computer on versus turn it off when not in use. Leaving the computer on uses electricity and keeps the machine hot (heat is not good for electronics). Turning the machine on creates a surge of electricity that is not good for the electronic components. Quickly turn your computer off and on fifty times to see what I mean.

If you followed the instructions in that last sentence, you are probably reading the rest of this post from another computer.

I have not turned off my computers (in general) for more than ten years. I don’t know if it has increased the life expectancy or not. My computers last as long as anyone else that I know. I do know that every time I do a reboot it takes five solid minutes to get to a point where I can use the computer. That alone is reason enough not to shutdown when I walk away from the computer.

TSPY=30.4

If you find yourself repeatedly entering the same information into web forms, Roboform can save you some serious time.  You tell Roboform your personal information: name, address, phone, fax, email, instant message ID.  When you want to fill out a form on the web, Roboform does the typing.  It will even remember your passwords if you so desire.

There is a USB version that you can take with you when you move from computer to computer.

TSPY=2.65

Depending on where you bought your computer, it probably came with a browser that starts at a corporate web site – Dell – Apple – Gateway.  The first thing you probably do when you get to this page is go somewhere else.

Change your start page to something more useful.  For many years I used a custom page that I created.  A late version of it can be found here.  This page has every “normal” thing I do listed with a link.  I can check my web mail, login to Blackboard, view the news and go to my favorite pages.  There is even a Google search at the top.  Ten years ago, my start page used Alta Vista as the search engine.  Times change.

Now I use Protopage as my start page.  Protopage overcomes the main problem I had with my original start page – ease of change.  My old page required me to edit the HTML of the page.  That almost always involved FTP’ing the file as well.  It was difficult enough that I didn’t add temporary links like I do now.  Just today I added three links to my Protopage.  I put them in the “test” window.  This is where potentially useful things go until I can decide if I really will use them often.  If I use the link enough, I will keep it.  Otherwise, I will remove it. 

TSPY=4.00