ignorant but not stupid ?

[CURIOUS]

This post is to any MVP that cares to answer.
I'm a newbie,also a grandfather many times over,just so
you know what you are dealing with.
I'm sure most,if not all MVPs are highly educated and
have years of computer experience. However, while reading
the posts on this newsgroup and others it occured to me
that most MVPs when answering complicated questions will
refer people to one or more Microsoft KB articles,or to
Kellys and other websites to cure what ails them.
My question is as follows. How do you so easily find
these KB articles? Do you have them downloaded onto your
computers and type in keywords,or how do you accomplish
this with such ease?
It occured to me that if I and others with little
experience had the ability to easily research these
things we could more easily help ourselves and in the
process possibly even become more adept with computers.

However, since I am almost totally computer illiterate,
the KB articles would probably be far too complicated for
me to comprehend and make use of. In the past few weeks I
have seen answers to questions posted here that I tried
to follow through on, only to find that the instructions
led me to a dead end. Apparently,my computer {XPHome}is
not set up the same as some others.
I'm beginning to ramble, so will thank you in advance for
your assistance.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

Not an easy question to answer. First, many questions appear over and over
again. Hence, many of us have responses saved which may also include links
to Knowledge Base Articles. Personally, I keep these responses in a
specific folder that I keep open but minimized when I'm working the boards.
This folder has numerous sub-folders divided by issue. In each sub-folder I
place a response or, often, multiple responses that might apply to the
issue. Lest you think this is only a device that would be of use to those
of us who provide responses, it also helps me deal with issues on my own
setup. Further, when I save a response, I often give it a more descriptive
title as the subject line of the post might not be revealing of what might
be the true nature of the topic or issue.

Second, I also have a Knowledge Base sub-folder in my Favorites folder. In
the KB sub-folder, I place links to various articles that I frequently use,
placing each one in a topic related sub-folder of its own.

Third, we search the Knowledge Base:
http://support.microsoft.com/support/search/c.asp?FR=0
And yes, some of use have Knowledge Base articles on our hard drive. Many
MVPs have a subscription to Microsoft TechNet which includes the entire
Knowledge Base on disk and is updated frequently. Unless, you need to
travel to some destination to help a client who may not have an Internet
connection, it's not really necessary since the link above will take you to
the online Knowledge Base site. If you have it on your computer and your
computer goes down, you may have to go online anyway to get to the Knowledge
Base, either using a separate computer if you have one or someone else's.

For particularly vexing issues for which there may be no immediate or
apparent answer, sometimes Google is a good source. Most problems a user
faces, even the most esoteric seeming, someone else has previously faced and
you can often find it at www.google.com. Just go to the site, click the
groups tab, type in your search criteria and press enter. That, by the way
is the beauty of these boards. If you run a search on a topic or problem
you are having, you can often find it has already been asked and answered
right here. I note you are posting through the web interface. Select any
group, click the search button on the page, it's just below where the list
of headers is displayed, a search box will appear and you can search by
topic, words in the body of the message or by Author.

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Greetings --

Michael's description of his methods is also a very accurate
portrayal of the way I work. Basically it breaks down to learning and
knowing how to find information, rather than simply learning and
remembering everything.


Bruce Chambers

--
Help us help you:



You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on
having both at once. -- RAH

 

[CURIOUS]

-----Original Message-----
Not an easy question to answer. First, many questions appear over and over
again. Hence, many of us have responses saved which may also include links
to Knowledge Base Articles. Personally, I keep these responses in a
specific folder that I keep open but minimized when I'm working the boards.
This folder has numerous sub-folders divided by issue. In each sub-folder I
place a response or, often, multiple responses that might apply to the
issue. Lest you think this is only a device that would be of use to those
of us who provide responses, it also helps me deal with issues on my own
setup. Further, when I save a response, I often give it a more descriptive
title as the subject line of the post might not be revealing of what might
be the true nature of the topic or issue.

Second, I also have a Knowledge Base sub-folder in my Favorites folder. In
the KB sub-folder, I place links to various articles that I frequently use,
placing each one in a topic related sub-folder of its own.

Third, we search the Knowledge Base:
http://support.microsoft.com/support/search/c.asp?FR=0
And yes, some of use have Knowledge Base articles on our hard drive. Many
MVPs have a subscription to Microsoft TechNet which includes the entire
Knowledge Base on disk and is updated frequently. Unless, you need to
travel to some destination to help a client who may not have an Internet
connection, it's not really necessary since the link above will take you to
the online Knowledge Base site. If you have it on your computer and your
computer goes down, you may have to go online anyway to get to the Knowledge
Base, either using a separate computer if you have one or someone else's.

For particularly vexing issues for which there may be no immediate or
apparent answer, sometimes Google is a good source. Most problems a user
faces, even the most esoteric seeming, someone else has previously faced and
you can often find it at www.google.com. Just go to the site, click the
groups tab, type in your search criteria and press enter. That, by the way
is the beauty of these boards. If you run a search on a topic or problem
you are having, you can often find it has already been asked and answered
right here. I note you are posting through the web interface. Select any
group, click the search button on the page, it's just below where the list
of headers is displayed, a search box will appear and you can search by
topic, words in the body of the message or by Author.

--
Michael Solomon MS-MVP
Windows Shell/User
Backup is a PC User's Best Friend
DTS-L.Org: http://www.dts-l.org/




.
Thanks to those who replied. I'm sure your answers to my

questions will assist me and others reading these posts
to help themselves. I'm also sure I and others should
make use of the help and support available on our
computers before asking simple questions to which the
answers are sitting on our computers waiting to be used.
And, I promise to attempt to find the answers to my
questions first, before posting to any newsgroup. This
however is sometimes a daunting task when one does not
know the question to ask to be able to solve the problem.
Again, thank you so much.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

You're welcome and with regard to the search, understood!

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[David Candy]

I only use Help and Support to seach the knowledge base (though I have it on
my hard drive as well - it's a super faulty program).

But Michael left one thing out about searching. The exact error message is
so important, because searching on paraphrasing doesn't work.

This is the new stupid KB format where they hide the OS at the bottom
The information in this article applies to:
a.. Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
b.. Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Last Reviewed: 10/26/2002 (1.0)
Keywords: kbenv kbhowto kbHOWTOmaster kbsetup kbUpgrade w2000upgrade
KB316639 kbAudITPro

My point here is about the keywords. Want to restrict a search to How To
articles (usually a restating of help) use KBhowto. There's a KB that tells
you all the kb words. I'll let you find it.

Also XP NT 5.1 is a minor upgrade to Windows 2000 NT 5.0. So it pays to
search win 2000 articles (and NT4 and earlier, especially for wierd stuff).
Adjust your search preferences in Help And Support to search all articles
and just use XP as a keyword to restrict.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

Excellent point about having the exact error message which is one of the
reasons why we always ask for it as well.

Thanks, David.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

David, did something get caught in your outbox; how many times did you have
to hit the send key?

 

[David Candy]

For two hours and 2 minutes or something. I actually deleted this one from
the outbox as it was not a distressed person post. There are two stuck now
for 19 minutes.This will be the third.

And people say I don't have patience.

And every 60 secs the dialog pops up. But this is one rare occion where XP
beeps when it's ignoring keystrokes. As they componentise windows UI
features like beeping if ignoring keystrokes are being dumped. All there
hard work from Win 3.1 and 95/NT4 shells are being thrown away.

Cascading menus were a big UI NO-NO on win 3.1, I believed MS when they said
they had research about this. Then in 95/NT4 cascading menu everywhere.
Either people changed or MS didn't care. Cacading menu's are hard to use,
especially if one is fatigued.

AFAIK Explorer is the only one (tracker, finder etc from other OSs) that has
a tree view. In 95 MS made it hard for newbies to discover it, and each
version the explorer shortcut got deeper and deeper into the Start menu
structure. It appears treeviews are a bad idea (well MS hides explorer
mode), Macs, BeOS, I think OS/2, the k.... windows shell clone for linux use
folder views. So MS made MMC with it's tree view, Active Directory with
incomprehensible tree views (if you have more than a handfull of users). If
treeviews are good why is explorer hidden and why doesn't anyone else agree
with them. If they are bad why introduce it anywhere it can fit.

The two are still stuck and heres a third to join them. It took 1.2 Mbytes
to post 6 x 6KB messages. I did a network capture as there is so much data
goes out (that when I saw that two posts had made it).

But if OE can't send all messages it doesn't move sent items from Outbox to
Sent Items. I sure one of these two has made it, but I stopped capturing so
don't know which one.

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

Man, I know what you mean. I finally had to access the newsgroups through
my Earthlink account news server. Stuff would either stick or the posts
would show up, then everything comes up no longer available and the posts
would disappear. I couldn't keep track of what had been answered and what
had not.

Thus far anyway, the Earthlink news server is not giving me any grief.

*Once we got to Windows 95, it really appeared Microsoft was trying to move
users away from Explorer in favor of "My Computer." That didn't really
work. As the OS has evolved, it seems they try ever harder to bury Explorer
and move users by default to "My Computer" or a similar arrangement.

Now they're talking about canning Explorer altogether in favor of indexing
and journaling, the underpinnings of which we've already begun to see in XP,
at least under the hood. They claim they're going to change the way the
processor is used and memory is addressed. Given all the horsepower that
would be necessary for full blown indexing and journaling, I sure hope they
work it out.

 

[sf]

Same idea different professions. I'm a special ed
teacher... and I had a conversation this week with a service
provider about how he could keep his "favorite" goals on his
computer.
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