Over time, we gather more tips than we can publish. Several readers of the TipSheet have asked in the past if there is any way we could make these tips available. Before we put the tips on our web site, the answer was usually no. However, starting this month, we will make the unpublished tips available. They will be grouped no more than a hundred to a volume. As they are published, they will be removed from that unpublished volume. All of the tips, both published and unpublished, will be shown in the three indexes. So this month the available number of tips will grow by almost 300.
If you think some of your toolbars are missing, you may be right. If the toolbar doesn't show up at all, choose View|Toolbar to turn it on. This is a toggle and will turn off the toolbar the next time you choose the command. To customize the contents of the toolbar, choose View|Options and click the General tab. You can use the check boxes in the Toolbar area to tell Microsoft Internet Explorer which components to display.
You can change the default Microsoft Internet Explorer display colors by choosing View|Options and clicking the General tab. Now, under Colors, click the background button and select your new color. Next, click the Text button and select that color. To finish, click OK. You may not notice any difference immediately, since most web sites define their own colors. The site's definition will take precedence over your selections.
If you'd like to modify some of your Explorer settings, you don't have to run the program, then choose View|Options. All you have to do is right-click the Internet Explorer icon and choose Properties. Now you can make whatever changes you like and your changes will apply the next time you run Explorer.
As you're navigating a Web page, you might decide to add the page to your Favorites folder. Don't bother to go all the way to the menu to choose Favorites|Add to Favorites. Instead, just click the right mouse button and choose Add to Favorites from the resulting menu.
You know that you can open a new window, then navigate to another site in that window. Here's a way to visit a new link and open a new window at the same time. Hold down Shift while you click a link. Microsoft Internet Explorer will open a new window containing the new site.
The usual log-in procedure is to double-click the Microsoft Internet Explorer icon, then wait while the home page loads, then open your Favorites folder to choose a site. Why go to a lot of trouble when you can let the computer work for you? Why not put a shortcut to the Favorites folder on your desktop? With the shortcut in place, you can open the folder and double-click on the site you want to visit. Microsoft Internet Explorer will open, Windows 95 will dial the phone, and you'll find yourself at the desired site. To place the shortcut on your desktop, run Windows Explorer and click the Windows folder. Locate the Favorites folder and use the right mouse button to drag the Favorites icon to your desktop. Release the mouse button and choose Create Shortcut(s) Here from the pop-up menu.
You may find that, although Microsoft Internet Explorer invokes your dialer, it may not automatically disconnect from the Internet service provider when you close the program. You may have to open the dialer (you'll find it in the taskbar) and manually disconnect. Right-click on the dialer icon and choose Disconnect.