Notepad is a text editor that is included in Microsoft's Windows 95. It has limited functionality, but is extremely easy to use. Another text editor with more features and the ability to handle larger files, Wordpad, is also included. To run Notepad, select START | PROGRAMS | ACCESSORIES | NOTEPAD.
Have you ever noticed that if you open up Notepad and start typing, the text just keeps going... and going... and going to the right? That's because by default, Notepad's Word Wrap option is turned off. The only thing that will start your text on the next line is hitting Enter. If you'd prefer to have Notepad wrap your text (in other words, move it to the beginning of the next line) whenever you reach the right edge of the window, just choose Word Wrap under the Edit menu before you start typing. Once this option is set, you can size the Notepad window up or down and still see all of your hard work inside it. Notepad adjusts the word wrap to match the size of the window.
You can insert the file name, date, time, page numbering, or all of the above, in the header or footer of a printed Notepad page. Choose File|Page Setup, and take a look at the Header and Footer options. By default, the setting '&f' next to Header tells Notepad to print the filename at the top of the page. Next to Footer, 'Page &p' tells Notepad to print the word 'Page', then the current page number in the footer. You can change these settings to anything you want (or delete them altogether) by typing any combination of commands on the Header and Footer lines. For a list of commands, click Header or Footer with the right mouse button and select the What's This button that appears. When you're done typing or deleting, click OK. The changes will affect every Notepad file, until you change them to something else.
Want to time- and date-stamp your Notepad file? In a previous tip, we told you that you could type '.LOG' at the top of a Notepad file to make it time- and date-stamp the file after every entry (after you close and then reopen the file). But if you're just looking for one stamp, hit F5 in any Notepad file. Insta-date.
If you're printing a Notepad file, don't expect it to print exactly as it appears on screen (unless you have the word wrap option set; then the margins will adjust according to what's visible in the Notepad window). Notepad's print margins are determined by the numbers in the Page Setup dialog box. To adjust Notepad's margins for printing, choose File|Page Setup, and change the measurements under Margins. (At least you get to see their effect on the page layout, even if the text in the preview isn't your own.) Click OK when you're done and print it.
When you receive a fax via Microsoft Fax, it appears as an item in your Microsoft Exchange Inbox. Double-click the item, and the Fax Viewer opens to display the contents of the fax. If you think you'll want to view the fax again, but don't want to have to go through Microsoft Exchange to do it, save the file with an AWD extension before closing the Fax Viewer. Choose File|Save Copy As, type in any name you want, navigate your way to the folder where you'd like to store the fax, and click Save. From now on, double-clicking this file icon opens the fax in a Fax Viewer window. (The AWD file is a copy of the original, so unless you need to do something with the fax other than read it, delete the one in MS Exchange.)