Why is it so many captchas are case sensitive – does it really matter if I enter ‘E’ or ‘e’? As well, have you noticed how often the letters are uppercase, so not only do you need to fiddle with the captchas in the first place, but you have to...

Dialogs are everywhere- those little popup boxes that give us an inside peek as to what the computer is up to. They’re often necessary (aren’t you glad there’s an ‘are you sure’ box when you’ve accidentally chosen to format your hard drive?), but sometimes they can be taken to extremes...

As veteran users of software, we are accustomed to managing our own files. More than likely, you’ve used Explorer to navigate around your hard drive, and grown accustomed to the file open and save dialogs. However, this reliance on files is actually not a service to the customer, but to...

As I read this title, I realize that this could be the start of a book, not a short article. Ultimately, every bit of software written is for somebody (even just for the programmer who wrote it). So this means that end user (or customer) has the final say as...

In my business I spend a lot of time at my computer. While I don’t mind it, I certainly don’t enjoy wasting my time, and keep on the lookout for ways to simplify my work. One method I’ve used successfully for some time is Windows keyboard shortcuts, which by a...

When a Florida flight crashed in December of 1972, the black box was of immense help in determining the cause of the crash. Sadly, it wasn’t design error or mechanical failure – it was human error. The recording indicated that the cockpit crew became absorbed in changing an indicator light...

The advantage of writing a newsletter such as this is that there is no end of stories out there about complicated equipment... I recently purchased an inexpensive DVD player (which may have been part of the problem). While it’s been a delight watching DVD movies, it’s been a major learning...