Skip to main content

Getting Your Computer Ready for School

Back when I was a student, everyone packed up their portable typewriter for the move to campus. Lots of people got a new typewriter as a graduation gift, but I didn’t. I ended up using one we bought when I was in high school.

The story is probably the same for you, except that it’s a computer, not a mechanical typewriter.

Whether you just bought a new one or kept your old faithful companion with all of its stickers, you need to do a few things to get the machine ready for college.

Getting Old Faithful ready for college

Is Old Faithful sick?

If the machine crashes a lot, has trouble (and takes a long time) doing things, or pops up weird ads to play poker or look at porn, you probably have a virus. (You just had to download that fancy screensaver, didn’t you?) Take a deep breath—bite the bullet—pay the computer repair shop to clean it up for you.

Now that Old Faithful is feeling better …

  • Back up the really important stuff. (Your only picture of Uncle Ed, the school addresses of your buddies, and so forth.) A flash drive is a good place to store this kind of thing. If you have a Gmail account, you have space on Google Drive. That’s another good place to store backups. Computers crash at school. Computers get stolen. There are some things you don’t want to lose.
  • Clean house. Go through all those files and ask yourself whether you really need that homework from your first Junior semester in high school.
    • You might like to delete or hide some of those embarrassing photos.
    • And that desktop image.

Both Old Faithful and the new guy

  • Update your operating system. You should do this after the housecleaning, and it will take a looooong time, so plug your computer into the power supply, and set it up to download the updates before you go to bed. Even a brand new computer should go through this every month or so.
    • Apple users: Click the little picture of an apple in the upper left corner of your screen. Then choose “About This Mac.” Choose “Software Update.” You might get a list of items to choose—you want all of them. If the screen says “Your Mac is up to date,” congratulations: you are done!
    • Windows users: Follow the instructions in this link. If you get to choose which things to update, you want all of them.
  • Get Google Chrome web browser. This is the one that works best with University stuff. Go to Google Chrome Web Browser.
  • If you already have Google Chrome, run the update program. (It’s not automatic.) When you are in the Chrome browser, click the Chrome drop-down menu in the upper left, then choose “About Google Chrome” and follow the instructions.
  • Set up a file folder system. You want a quick way to find things on your computer, and the strategy is much the same for Apple, Windows, and Google Drive. (By the way, you can put folders inside other folders, so you can have a Fall Semester folder and an English folder inside that one.) The only files that belong on the desktop are the ones you use daily. Everything else should be hidden in folders.
Labels:

Comments

  1. Curt AllenAugust 7, 2022 at 2:01 PM

    An earlier version of this had an unhelpful link for Windows updates. I think this one is better.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Writing Teacher in Summer

It has been a long time since I had the self-discipline to simply stop for the summer. There were always summer courses to teach, curricula to rewrite, etc. I promised myself, however, that this summer would be different. Yes, I’m spending a lot of effort on this blog, and I’ll put in big time preparing for fall classes, but this will be a more relaxed summer than most, time to do some other things: I started the summer running sound effects for Mid-Ohio Opera. When the phone rang on stage, I was pushing the button. When lightning flashed and thunder rolled, I was pushing the button. I spent a week at Disney in Florida with grandkids, my first trip there. I get the idea that I’m one of the last people in Ohio to get there for the first time (probably not true). The highlight of July will be a bike trip on the Great Allegheny Passage bike trail from Pittsburgh to Cumberland, Maryland, about 45 miles of riding a day. Fun stuff! ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Adulting

Business people talk about “hard skills” and “soft skills.” Hard skills can be taught with books of instructions—things such as driving a standard shift, using Microsoft Word, or analyzing a blood sample. Soft skills are such things as showing up on time for work, giving the boss the proper respect, wearing appropriate clothing for the task, and keeping your work area tidy. Many college students figure that the hard skills are all they need, but the hard skills are relatively easy to teach; if you lack soft skills, you will struggle in college and have a lot of trouble finding and keeping a job. Somewhere in the middle area between these are the adulting skills. People who lack these skills might be able to pass courses, but their time in college will be very difficult. Here are a few you will need—and now is a good time to begin working on them. Doing laundry. Surprised that I put it first? The ...
Post a Comment
Read more