PC Doctor November 23, 2011

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Dear PC Doctor,

I've signed up for some email newsletters, coupons and other websites with my email address. Now I get so many emails everyday for advertisements that I don't really want anymore. They're not exactly spam because I originally signed up for them in the first place. What can I do? Should I just mark them as spam?

            Mark

Dear Mark,

I can see how that can be a problem. Sorting out the real mail from the other junk can be a pain! Yes, using the “Spam” button might work in this case, however, like you said, it's not exactly spam since you signed up for it.

A better (but more time-consuming) method is to unsubscribe from the email listings. Almost every automated email that you receive in your email inbox will have an “Unsubscribe” link at the very bottom of the email. Check it out the next time you get a sale email or newsletter. If you click on the link, it will either take you to a page saying that you have been removed from the email list. You might need to manually type in your email address to get it removed from the list. Don't worry, this is only to remove you from the list, not to add your email address to any more email lists.

It does take some time to unsubscribe from the emails. I was surprised by how many things I actually received that I didn't want to get anymore! Next time you go to sign up for another website, ask yourself if you really want to add your email to another email list!

            PC Doctor


Dear PC Doctor,

I use Firefox for my web browser. I guess it comes with spell check because sometimes I type something out and it has a little red squiggly line under it. It's nice but I can't always figure out how I'm spelling it wrong. Is there an easy way to figure out how Firefox thinks I should spell it?

            Caroline

Dear Caroline,

Yes! There is in fact a way to check the alternate spelling suggestions in Firefox. When you come across a word that ends up being underlined with red, just right-click on the word with your mouse. A little menu will appear and all the suggested words will appear in bold! If you see the correct spelling listed, click on it and your misspelled word will be fixed!

If you type a word and get the red lines and you know for sure that it's a real word (or maybe it's an odd name that you type a lot) you can add it to the Firefox dictionary so it won't be marked as wrong in the future. Right-click on the word and in the popup menu, click on “Add to Dictionary”.

            PC Doctor

Until next time… happy computing!

Posted: to Athol Library News on Wed, Nov 23, 2011
Updated: Wed, Nov 30, 2011