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What's Happening at CPCUG—Thursday, January 5, 2012

Look for an entirely new CPCUG website beginning in 2012. It's almost ready and there are going to be frequent updates along with members-only content. Stay tuned to this space for the announcement.

2012 Montgomery County Agricultural Fair Aug 10-18

The Capital PC User Group will once again staff the Internet Cafe at the 2012 Montgomery County Agricultural Fair. Come join your fellow CPCUGers for a fun time at the Fair. CPCUG volunteers get in FREE. To access details on the Fair and a sign-up sheet for volunteers « click here » .

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Support CPCUG With Your Online Purchases
by Gabe Goldberg

Thanks to Nan Blissett, CPCUG has an online "store" associated with the Amazon.com mega-shopping Web site. If you haven't visited Amazon lately, or haven't ventured beyond its huge book selection, you may be surprised that it's become an entire shopping mall offering electronics, apparel, baby items, beauty products, gourmet food, sports and outdoors items, and a wealth of other categories. As an approved Amazon Associate, CPCUG earns from 4 to 10 percent on Amazon purchases referred from the CPCUG.ORG Web site. The higher our referrals, the greater our earnings will be. So when purchasing from Amazon—think CPCUG.ORG! This helps fund CPCUG's revitalization and supports our community service activities (free meetings, science fair judging and prizes, computer recycling, etc.)

Shopping with CPCUG is easy and costs no extra time or money. Instead of going straight to the Amazon.com Web site, simply go to http://shop.cpcug.org/ and select the category in which you're interested. Once you're on the Amazon Web site, purchases you make in all categories during that visit will be credited to CPCUG.

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Google Pocket Guide
by Tara Calishain, Rael Dornfest, and DJ Adams
Publisher: O’Reilly Media
Pages: 129
Price: $9.95 at Amazon.com or oreilly.com

Beyond just going to the Google Web site and performing a search, like I normally do, the book delves a lot deeper into what Google has to offer and what tips and tricks can be used to make an effective search on the Internet. The book is divided into four parts.

Part One
“What Can You Do With Google?” This section explains what Google isn’t (Google index is not a snapshot of everything online), and what Google is (Google is a searchable index).

Part Two
“Asking For What You Want” This section shows you how to use phrase searches by surrounding a phrase (roses are red) with quotation marks to generate results. There were a lot of search features in this section that one can use, including AND, OR, the date range, and the minus sign to exclude that word from your search. As an alternative, the authors pointed out that a person can use Advanced Search to pick and choose what they want instead of using Google search.

Part Three:
“Understanding What You Get” Okay, you know what you wanted to search for, and now you have the search results. The question is, What did you get from the search? This section provides a little bit more understanding as to how to use Safe Search to filter out offensive searches, understanding of the different parts of the search, and the importance of checking your spelling.

Part Four:
“Other Google Services and Features” Google goes beyond just being a search engine. Google offers other services such as a directory, catalog, image searching, news, shopping, and, of course, groups.

I like the fact that this book summed up all the different searches that can be performed using Google. I also like that throughout the book, the authors provided various examples for a person to follow while sitting in front of the computer, and, to practice these searches, they are repeated in the Appendix

—Reviewed by Tammy Barbee, The Web Lady

For more from Tammy Barbee, visit—
www.webmastertoolcenter.com www.twitter.com/thewlady