Notes for Staff of Nonprofit Technology Resources

Refurbishing Personal Computers

I've begun documenting the process for use at Unison, Mars Hill, and of course NTR

  • The only thing I've got down so far is a description of the 5-minute first analysis of an untested machine, on a page called Refurbishing Personal Computers
  • My second draft, is much more long-winded, including a detailed description of the boot-up process Refurbishing Personal Computers, revised 9/24. Next step is to separate this long text into several linked pages.

    • NTR's Community Partners Program

    Neighborhood Energy Centers

  • When Dave worked for the Energy Coordinating Agency, he suggested to Director Liz Robinson and MIS Daniel Paul that ECA should play a role in encouraging its partner orgs to develop community technology centers, possibly in partnership with CTCNet, NTR and the Reuse Collaborative. ECA's Neighborhood Energy Centers are Philadelphia-area CDCs which NTR could approach individually or collectively, with or without ECA's active assistance.

    • Orleans Technical Institute

  • On 9/20 Dave saw this msg from Bonnie Kassof (215) 728-4712), of Orleans Technical Institute, to Ed Schwartz's FAN mailing list, Re: JOB TRAINING: ' ... we are starting a part-time day program on November 1, 1999 for our Computerized Office Technology diploma program.... ' for low-income people. A potential partner?

    • Computer Reuse Resources

    Reuse Collaborative

  • Dave's 9/20 notes on the Reuse Collaborative.

    • How to Set Up Hardware

  • External CD-ROM drive (Backpack)

    • Dave's Bookmarks

    The Big List

  • This is mostly for Dave's reference, but feel free to check out Dave's Big List of Bookmarks. You'll find Gardening info here along with a pile of yet-to-be-categorized junk.

    • Where Dave Shops for Computer Hardware Bargains

    Auction

    uBid Online Auction
    Egghead.com Auctions: Action-Packed Online Bidding!
    Auction-Sales
    Auction Floor
    AuctionMax

    Retail

    CNET Shopper.com: Where to buy online
    Pricewatch lists many vendors by price
    Hardware Street
    PCConnection

    Phila Area Consulting

    Vic Winder, a former NTR VISTA, is now in private practice. His email address is winderenterprise@juno.com. His company, CBI Inc is at 2702 North 5th St, Phila PA. Phone numbers: 215-425-7172, -7173, -7174, fax: -7175.

    So You Want to Make Your Own Web Page?!

    Get a Free Web Site and Web-Based Email Account

    Yahoo! GeoCities "Get a free home page." You'll be prompted to choose a user id and password, then to choose a "neighborhood" for your site according to your interests. Yahoo will set up a web-based email account for you (userid@yahoo.com).
    You will use a section of your site, temporarily at least, to post the pages you create in these lessons, and to test any pages you may wish to create for NTR. But you'll probably want to reserve most of the 11mb of free space which Yahoo will set aside for you on its servers for your own personal stuff. What stuff? Well, maybe your resume, your favorite web sites, photos, anything you'd like to share with the world. My site includes my piano playing in MIDI format, but many sites just start by listing favorite links.
    Once you've completed the questionnaire and agreed to the terms of service, GeoCities will create your page, display its address for you, and send a confirming email to your new email address at Yahoo. Click on the link to your page and check it out!

    Create Folders for Web Files

    Use Windows Explorer to create New Folders, using folder names such as:

    • C:\My Documents\Yahoo (for working copies of your main web folder)
    • C:\My Documents\Yahoo\Backup (for previous revisions)
    • C:\My Documents\Yahoo\NTR (for working copies of NTR pages)
    • C:\My Documents\Yahoo (for previous revisions of NTR pages)

    Download a Copy of Your New Home Page

  • Sign in to your new Yahoo account at the Welcome to Yahoo! GeoCities page
  • Type in your User ID and Password in the appropriate boxes
  • You needn't bother clicking the box that says "Remember User ID and Password," but if you are the only person likely to use your computer to access a Yahoo account (and you're not concerned about someone else accessing your account from your computer) you may find it handy to click this box. Yahoo would then place a "cookie" file on your hard drive, recording your user id and password so that the cookie info could be retrieved next time you access that page.
  • Click the Sign In button.
  • Once your sign-in is processed Yahoo should display the Yahoo! GeoCities page.
  • Scroll down to the Member Tools section and click on File Manager.
  • Scroll down and click on the Enter the File Manager button.
  • Once the File Manager page loads, you should see a file named index.html.
  • Shift-Click on the View button to the right of the file name.
  • Save the file to C:\My Documents\Yahoo\Backup
  • Use Windows Explorer to copy the file to C:\My Documents\Yahoo

    • Get Mail

  • Check your Yahoo Mail

    • Web Page Editors

    There are lots of programs you can use to generate web page coding. If you're a die-hard programmer like me, you may want to learn how to write the code in a plain text editor such as Windows Notepad. But it's a lot of unnecessary work now that so many programs have been developed to generate code. Today most word processors (such as MS Word) and desktop publishing programs (such as PageMaker) will generate web pages.

    Some of the most popular web publishing programs for Windows and Macintosh are listed at Yahoo! GeoCities - Help: FTP FAQs.

    I've chosen Netscape as the Web Page Editor for these lessons but you may find another that you like better. Feel free to check them out and let me know what I'm missing!

    Install Netscape

    If you're not running Netscape Communicator Version 4 or Navigator Gold Version 3, download either of them from Netscape and install. Version 4 comes in several flavors. Don't bother with the professional version, but get the basic, minimum, smallest file (about 13mb). Use the SmartDownload feature if you can, so that if your download is interrupted you'll be able to resume where you left off.
    NTR staff may also get Version 3 from Dave's CD labeled SETUP. The file is named G32e304p.exe and it's in folder \Netscape\NavigatorGold.

    Download Sample Files

    View Sample Pages in Editor

    Create a Blank Page

  • In your Web Editor create a new file (in Netscape 3 Gold choose File menu, option New Document, Blank)
  • Type a few lines of text, or cut and paste some text from one of your files or from an existing web page
  • The content could be a brochure, a lesson plan (like Dave's backpack.htm) or a memo
  • Drawing a blank? Okay, just skip on to the next section

    • Add Dave's Gallery

  • Press Enter twice to Skip to insert two blank lines.
  • Type "Dave's Gallery"
  • Press Enter
  • Type "Dave Lives in Philadelphia PA"
  • Press Enter
  • Type "Dave's Car"
  • Save your file as test.htm

    • Save Your Page

  • Save your file as test.htm

    • Add Formatting

  • Highlight the first line on your page.
  • Change the paragraph formatting from Normal to Heading 1.
  • Try other paragraph formatting choices.
  • Highlight a word.
  • Make it bold.
  • Make it red.

    • Save Your Page

  • Save your work often!

    • Add Images

    Turn Your Tool Bars On

  • If you're using Netscape 3 Gold
  • Select the Options menu
  • Turn on all the available toolbars so that a check mark appears next to File/Edit, Character Format and Paragraph Format Toolbars
  • If you're using something else
  • deal with it!

    • Add Text Link

  • At bottom of page choose Insert Horizontal Line
  • Type "Return to Home Page" then press Enter
  • Select the entire line
  • Click Make Link button on the Character Format Toolbar (or Select Insert menu, Link option)
  • Click Browse File button
  • Select file index.htm
  • Press OK

    • Add Graphic Link

  • Select Dave's car thumbnail image
  • Select Make Link
  • Select Browse File
  • Select honda15.gif
  • Press OK
  • Add some text near the image: "Click on the picture to see a larger image"

    • Save Your Page

  • Save your work again!

    • View Your Page

  • Select View in Browser

    • View the HTML Code

  • Select View Document Source

    • Make a Links Page

  • Find the BOOKMARK.HTM file in your Netscape folder and make a copy called LINKS.HTM in your MyDocuments folder
  • Open LINKS.HTM first in a Netscape Browser window, then in a Netscape Composer (version 4) or Editor (version 3) window.
  • Select View menu, option View Document Source
  • Dave's patrons.htm is a sample file which was created from a Bookmark file in Fall 1997
  • Notice that the source code starts with a comment saying that this is a Netscape-generated file.

    • Miscellaneous Resources

  • Check out the Web Authoring section in Yahoo Internet Life - Useful Site of the Day - Computer/Internet Sites
  • Dave's Fall 1997 bookmark list, patrons.htm, includes a section called Web Site, How to Make Your Own which may contain some helpful links among the outdated ones. One day perhaps they'll be weeded out and incorporated here.

    • WS-FTP: An Alternative to Yahoo/Geocities File Manager

    To Be Continued

    ...

    Where I Go When I Have Nothing Better to Do

    Work (Ugh!)

    Friends

    U Penn Astronomy Outreach Program Kids and Science

    Hit the Road Jack!

    Yahoo! Maps and Driving Directions

    Return to Home Page Dave Butler's Rainforest Cottage at GeoCities

    This page written by Dave Butler, Computer Guide
    dbut@erols.com


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