БДВ VANISHING E-MAIL: E-Mail programs which support HTML and graphics such as Netscape Messenger and Outlook Express are a big advance over straight text e-mail. But the added capability can cause unexpected results. Sometimes mail you just read or sent seems to vanish. Closing and re-opening the mail program may help as well as a re-boot. But when these steps fail, it may be that the missing mail is "stuck" in the respective files such as "Inbox", "Sent", and "Deleted". You can get at this mail and with a little work even reconstruct it to a readable form:

Find your mail-folder files via Windows Explorer. For Netscape 3.x and 4.x, they are within the browser folder; for Internet Explorer 3.x and 4.x, they are in stand-alone folders because the mail program is separate from the browser.
Mail files come in pairs: 2 for the Inbox, 2 for the Outbox, 2 for Deleted/Trash, etc. These files may or may not have file extensions; the smaller file of the pair usually has mail header information and the larger file has the actual e-mail.
Use a program such as Quick View to open the larger file. [You can generally determine which files have mail just by their byte size; when empty, they may range from 0 to 2.5K bytes depending on your mail program.] If Quick View doesn't work, use a Word Processor such as Wordpad or MSWorks. Text editors, such as Notepad, usually cannot render the contents.
If the missing mail is in text format and you want to save it, then copy/paste each letter from Quick View or a Word Processor into a new text file.
If the missing mail is in HTML format, to save it or at least make it more readable, it can be copy/pasted into a new text file then renamed to an htm extension.
If you just want to read missing email without saving, then copy/paste the entire mail file into the same directory. Rename the pasted file by changing the extension to htm. Open the new file with your browser. There will probably be some formatting oddities many of which can be corrected if you know a little HTML.
If you experience missing or garbled email often, get in the habit of saving it to portable disk as you receive/send it if you want to read it later or save it permanently.

БДГ LAZY BUTTON: Working in Windows often requires a lot of repetitive functions such as selecting OK/Cancel or Yes/No in a Dialogue Box. There are a few freeware/shareware programs that allow you to pre-select the button to be pushed thereby saving repetitive functions. These are nifty little time savers, but depending on what items you have pre-selected, unexpected results may occur. Where this becomes a problem is when you are trying to select a specific file from a list of files and the "Button" program activates. As a result either no file or the wrong file is selected. No need to get rid of the "Button" program - just disable it temporarily.

БДД FRAMED BY AOL: If you are using AOL3.0 for Windows95, the built in browser is Internet Explorer. There are two noticeable problems with using this browser within the AOL framework:

Certain features found on web-pages which Internet Explorer can handle are disabled by AOL.
AOL's Tool Bar cannot be hidden. With the small size screen of a laptop, this tool bar materially limits the exposed view of a web-page.
Solution: After signing on to AOL, when you want to browse the web, open your browser [either Internet Explorer or Netscape] as a stand-alone program. You'll increase viewing space and enable the full functionality of your browser. For fast access to your browser, put a shortcut to it on the Start Menu; press Ctrl + Esc when you are ready to open it.

БДЕ OFFLINE GAMING : Ever get knocked off the web while playing a game or cut your play short because your ISP charges are piling up or you don't want to tie up the phone line? If these games are created from Javascript or Java Applets [such as word games, fill-in-the-blank, crosswords, hangman, jigsaw puzzles] and your browser is Internet Explorer4.x, then play offline instead. You can try to save the game while online but often this fails to get the desired results. As discussed in Tips #36, #93 and #112, the "Cache" for IE4.x [and AOL3.0 for Windows95] is very useful for offline activities. Once you have accessed the game while online, you can play it offline. Just be sure the game page has fully loaded - it's not necessary to play it online. After you sign off, open the "Temporary Internet Files" folder and find the game file [usually an HTM/HTML extension]. Try to recall the game's URL to locate the proper file. You can now play offline. If you want to keep the game, you need to copy the game file and all its related files which may be several "gifs", "jpgs" and "class" files strewn throughout your Cache. If you have alot of other browsed pages in your Cache at the same time, it may be difficult to find all the correct game-related files. If you know the URL of the game file, then clear the Cache completely, go back online directly to the game page and cache it. {For this operation it is best to set your browser preference to "Open on a Blank" if you are using a stand-alone browser rather than a shell like AOL provides. This will keep your Cache clean of other pages.} After caching the game online, sign off. Your Cache is now populated with just the game files. Copy the entire contents of the Cache, create a new folder, and paste all the cached files into the new folder. The game is now permanent to play whenever you want.

БДЖ AWOL HOMEPAGE?: Web-site authors after uploading new material to their FTP directories should always re-check their web-sites. When there are unexpected results, a few simple steps can be taken:
Clear your Cache before you access the revised site.
If a picture appears to be missing, right click on the missing icon symbol and select Show Picture.
Close and reopen your browser. Sign off your ISP and/or close your ISP software.
If problems still occur, re-boot then re-access your web-site.
Still having problems, then re-upload the missing files.

Finally, complain to the web-site provider; they may be having FTP problems.

БДЗ SHOW YOUR FILE: If you have a full- blown HTML-Mail program such as Netscape Communicator's Messenger or Outlook Express and your recipient can handle HTML mail, then send an HTML file on your system as a page instead of an attachment.
In Netscapes mail program, open the HTML file in Composer, copy it and then paste it into a new message. [The Send function from Navigator will only place a link to your internal file in the mail message; copying the file from Navigator will paste as text into your message without any graphics.]
In Outlook Express, open the HTML file with Internet Explorer, copy it and then select Mail from the GO Menu. Paste it into a new message. [The Send function on the File Menu will only place an attachment of the html file with no graphics in your message.]

If a picture is missing from the outgoing message, backspace over the missing picture icon, then insert the picture manually.

БДИ AOL "ART" FILES : If you use AOL3.0/4.0 for Windows95, then copying files from the Cache may produce "art" files in place of the expected "gif" or "jpg" files. When you try to read a copied-from-cache htm[l] file, some graphics may be missing. The graphic files with the "art" extension can be read in your browser individually, but it is necessary to rename them with a "gif" or "jpg" extension in order for them to appear in the htm[l] file. However, even though renamed, the graphic files cannot be opened with a graphic program. To make these graphic files work in your graphic program[s], there are two methods:
When you open "art" files individually in your browser, right click on the picture. Save it is a "bmp" file. Then you may convert the "bmp" file to the graphic format of your choice.
If you have already re-named an "art" file to a "gif" or "jpg" extension in order to make it appear on a copied-from-cache htm[l] file, then right click on the graphic when you open the htm[l] file. Save it as a "bmp" file.

To avoid "art" file problems completely, don't browse the web with your AOL software. After signing on, open your browser as a "stand-alone". Then your copied-from-cache graphic files will maintain their native extensions.

БДЙ ARTWORK OF YOUR OWN: You don't have to be a graphic artist to construct unique pictures. Many of us just stick a few pictures from our clip-art collections on a document rather than try to create our own "art". As discussed in Tip #131, graphic files can be manipulated/resized/flipped/shrunk, etc. in order for the graphic to fit on one page for printing. The same approach can be useful when creating a "compound" graphic - a new graphic that is a conglomeration of one or more clip-art files. If an existing graphic has a border that is unsuitable in the new compound graphic, shrink the width and height in both the normal view and upside-down view to shave the border off; usually just a one or two pixel reduction will work. Dissimilar background colors among pictures created with different colour palettes can be eliminated by a copy/paste operation into new files that use the same colour palettes; then backgrounds can be painted the same colour. With a little practice, you can make your own art- work that is customized to the content of your document and does not have that obvious "clip-art" look.

БЕА POPUP SLAYER: Geocity and Tripod offer free web-space, but there is a penalty for site visitors: the Popup Advertisement. [If you access Tripod or Geocity sites with the AOL shell over your browser, a full page ad rather than just a popup ad appears. All the more reason to never access the WWW with AOL as long as you have a browser which can be run as a standalone.] To the rescue comes The Close Popup Program which will kill the popup ad to reveal the entire web-page. The Popup killer works with both Netscape and Internet Explorer; it's small and it's free.

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