March 2007
Jim Scheef, Moderator
Lisa Leifels, Reporter

We welcome questions from the floor at the start of our General Meetings. In addition, members who are not able to attend the General Meeting may submit questions to askdacs@dacs.org. We will ask the question for you and post the reply in DACS.ORG. Please provide as much information as possible since we can’t probe during the session.

Q. I have an HP All-in-One Printer connected to a Mac. When I print out PDF files from within a web browser window, some of the lines on the bottom half inch of the page don’t print out, but I can view the entire document on the screen.
A. Here are a few different ideas you can try to help narrow down the cause of the problem. When printing PDF files from within your web browser, use the print icon or print menu item provided in the Adobe Acrobat Reader's toolbar, do NOT use the web browser's print facility. Try saving the PDF file to disk and then opening up the PDF file in Adobe Acrobat Reader outside of the browser. You can then change the margin settings and save them. Then open up the PDF file again from within the web browser.

See if you are able to print other types of files, such as a text file or a Microsoft Word document. This will determine if the problem is system-wide or just specific to Adobe Acrobat files. If the problem only occurs in PDF files, then you may need to update your Adobe Acrobat Reader software. If it is possible try printing the same file to a different printer. If the file prints out fine on a different printer, then you may want to download the latest printer driver, uninstall the old printer driver and install the new printer driver.

Q. Does anyone know how to create a parallel printer port on a notebook? I have some software which requires that I use a parallel port dongle for security reasons.
A. This is a common problem on notebook computers that have too few parallel and serial ports for connecting to peripheral devices. You can use the long, thin PC Card slot, formerly known as the PCMCIA slot to add a PC Card, (or compact flash card) which can be used to add a parallel port. You may also want to contact the software manufacturer to see if they will replace the dongle with a USB key.

Q. Now that thumb drives are getting bigger is it possible to run a complete application on a thumb drive?
A. Yes. Software gurus have updated an assortment of applications to work directly off of your thumb drive. There is a portable edition of the Firefox browser, Thunderbird email, OpenOffice and a zip program to archive files. Award winning Migo software enables you to create an encrypted backup on your portable drive to use Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express, Internet Explorer, on another PC and then synchronize the data back to your own PC. You can also use a U3 smart drive to carry your applications and store your data. Just plug it into any PC and you will have access to a large number of the applications. When you unplug it, no personal data will be left behind. Go to the U3.com website to see a complete list of the software available.

Q. Has anyone had experience with Adobe Photoshop Album for managing photo files?
A. Adobe Photoshop Album is no longer available. You may want to consider buying Adobe Photoshop Elements, which is a simpler and less expensive program to use than Adobe Photoshop. It gives you the power to store, edit and show off your photos in creative ways. Microsoft Digital Imaging Suite is another software program that was also recommended.

Submit any question to: askdacs@dacs.org.