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General FAQs About Windows and MasterCook
1. MAC: Exporting Recipes For All MasterCook UsersMany Window's MC users won't be able to import recipes that are exported in this Mac only format. To export recipes in the universal (.mxp) format, go to Preferences under the Tools menu. Under the option "Text Format for Recipe Export, Paste and Drop", click on the box by ".MXP/Universal Format". Once this option is chosen, all recipes you export, send via the recipe mailer, or copy and then paste into email messages will be in the format that everyone can import, regardless of their platform or version of MasterCook. Recipes in the universal format will contain a header that looks similar to this: * Exported from MasterCook Mac* [ Top of Page ] 2. MAC: Which version is MasterCook for the Mac?The latest version of MasterCook for the Mac is MC 4.06. If you are purchasing a new copy of the program, you will want to look for this specific version, which may be marked on the CD itself, but not on the box. MasterCook Express is another title to look for. It is 4.06 Mac/4.07 PC, both on the same CD. It comes with fewer included recipes than the other version, but does have the full-featured program engine. It does not have a paper manual, but a pdf copy of the manual is included on the CD. You may see this product in a box, or just the CD alone. We've seen it CD-only (no box) at stores like Best Buy and compUSA on the bargain shelves. Other places to try: http://bargaindog.about.com/ (click on cooking and search) [ Top of Page ] 3. MASTERCOOK: Adding a Degree Symbol in a RecipeQ: How do I enter the degree symbol in the [recipe] directions? A: These are ASCII characters (using the Arial font), and will translate into MC's font without becoming something weird. Hold down the ALT key while typing in 0176 on the number pad (not the numbers at the top of the keyboard) or ALT+0186. Below are a few symbols and the keys needed: alt + 0176 ° Remember these work for the Arial font with a PC. If you send a recipe by e-mail with these symbols, they may not appear as intended if the recipient is using another font, etc. You should also remember not to use the one-character fractions in the ingredients section of the recipe. MasterCook needs the three-character fractions (like "1/2") in order to calculate properly. If a font other than Ariel is your system font, these codes may not work. Use Character Map (Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Character Map) and scroll to your "system" font for a table of characters. The correct code for a selected character will be found in the lower right-hand corner. [ Top of Page ] 4. MASTERCOOK: Buster for MasterCookBuster is a Dos-App written by Glen Hosey. It automates most of the "gross" or global edits that we do over and over again to clean up mailed recipes and ready them for import into MasterCook. Go here to get Buster and companion help and quick start files:
Here are some sites to check out about Buster: Gail's Buster Page Q. Is anyone having a problem of "no recipes found" in Buster because of the new heading: * Exported from MasterCook* A. No, not since Glen updated Buster! Download the latest version (2.0J) of Buster Glen was kind enough to modify Buster so it can handle the new * Exported from MasterCook * heading which doesn't have as many blank spaces as the older version. I haven't had any problems with Buster not liking the header against the left margin. [ Top of Page ] 5. MASTERCOOK: Nuts&Berries for MacintoshFrom Paul: Finally, I've gotten a moment to finish up what I've been doing. Nuts&Berries is a freeware Macintosh application that assists in the importing of recipes into MasterCook (or into whatever application you like better). It does quite a lot of stuff, including importing MasterCook 5.0 format and converting it to MasterCook 4.0 format, or text. There are literally dozens of other features. The documentation isn't where I'd like it; in fact it isn't anywhere. I just don't have the time right now, and I apologize for that. But, you can probably muddle through and learn it by running the application and reading the balloon help. Of course, feel free to ask me questions and/or report any bugs you find. Helen Simmons has been a real trouper and tested this thing with me extensively, so I think it's pretty stable. It seems to work with system 7.1 on up. But, no doubt some things will need to be fixed. You can get it at: http://www.macinsearch.com/users/pjw/ I made Nuts&Berries to help Mac users, and I hope it does that. So, please let me know how (and if) you like it. -Paul [ Top of Page ] 6. MASTERCOOK: Text-To-MasterCook II Conversion UtilityThe Text-To-MasterCook II Conversion utility is a shareware program designed to be used with MasterCook II. MasterCook II is one of the most popular cooking programs on the market. Text-To-MasterCook is a shareware utility written in Microsoft's Visual Basic, and is designed to assist the user in converting a variety of text format recipe files into the MasterCook II export format for easy import into the MasterCook II database. You can download it from here: http://home.earthlink.net/~thingsmc/data/txttomc.zip [ Top of Page ] 7. MASTERCOOK: Tips for Safe Importing of RecipesCorrupt recipes could corrupt your cookbooks -- disaster! So keep in mind some "safe importing" procedures you should follow before importing MC-formatted recipes into your MasterCook -- even recipes from the mc-recipe mailing list or the mc-recipe-digest. Some points to remember: You should at least give the eagle eye to any recipe before importing it. Use a special cookbook just for newly-imported recipes. That way, if something corrupts it, you haven't lost all your treasured collections. The "safest" recipes are those that were exported from MasterCook without using an e-mail program (SMTP). Using an e-mail program (either Simple MAPI or insert by cut-and-paste) leaves the recipe vulnerable to mis-wrapped lines, broken tags, among other things. If a recipe does have mis-wrapped lines, at best you will get a funny-looking import; at worst, your cookbook will be corrupted. If using an e-mail program, compact/compress your mailbox(es). This gets rid of the bits and pieces that hang around after you delete e-mail or move it to another folder. Save all your e-mail as text files, including the headers (if you want them). You can do this directly through some e-mail programs, or use copy/paste into Notepad or other text editor. Run the text files through MCTagIt or Buster. They could catch some problems. Import the tagged or busted file. In MC 5/6, once your recipes are imported into your "holding" cookbook," select Refresh File List from the Tools menu. If you have a corrupt cookbook, you will then find out because the screen will have troubles refreshing. Try searching through your cookbook for anything. This, too, is a test to make sure your cookbook is in good working order. [ Top of Page ] 8. MasterCook: Harvesting Good Recipes from Problem CookbooksHave you had trouble with a particular cookbook? Maybe the recipes will not drag and drop over to a second book. Or maybe Search crashes repeatedly on the same cookbook. There may be a way to fix the cookbook, IF you can still get inside it. One thing to look for is that you may have recipes with names that are very very similar, like "Creme Fraiche" and "Crème Fraîche". Or you could have a corrupt recipe. A corrupt recipe is always a bigger problem, because it could eventually corrupt your entire cookbook. So do the following steps anyway, just to be sure you don't have a corrupt recipe. The following procedure can harvest the "good" recipes from your cookbook, and it will work in any version of MasterCook. Export the recipes: In MasterCook, display a list of all the recipes in the cookbook (if using MC 5, 6.x, or 7, Sort By > Title). Choose to EXPORT them all to a single file. Export will crash when it comes to a bad (corrupt) recipe. Find the last good recipe in the group by opening the export file in a text processor and checking the name of the last exported recipe in that group. Then reopen MC, SKIP the next recipe name in the list (because it's bad), and continue from that following recipe down to the end of the list. Export this second group to an export file 2, and continue in this fashion until you've exported everything you can. (You might find that you need to skip two or three recipes in a row before continuing.) Use MC TagIt or MC Buster on the export file: After you have your files of "good" exported recipes, be sure to run them through MCTagIt (or MC Buster if v. 4 and under). TagIt ( http://mctagit.com/ ) and MC Buster ( http://thehoseys.com/ ) can help fix some problems with our recipes, and alert us to those they can't deal with so we can look more closely at them. Reimport: Reimport into a NEW temporary cookbook. If they still don't copy over from there to your permanent cookbook, you probably have a too-similarly-named recipe. In that case, copying them over in smaller groups will let you suss out the problem. NOTES: Sometimes we can view the allegedly bad recipes in MC -- the ones that wouldn't export. If so, you might be able to copy it and paste into a text file, either by using Edit > Copy Recipe or by separately copy/pasting the individual fields in turn (title, ingredients, directions, etc,). If you can do this, REFORMAT that recipe from scratch (do NOT try to edit the mxp format of the recipe at all; take it back to a generic format). When going through the export procedure, the MasterCook program itself might start to complain. If it does, close down the program and move the suspect cookbook off to a spare folder on your hard drive, outside the MasterCook program files. Then reopen MC, refresh files (in MC 5 and up) and use File > Open from the main MC menu to open the cookbook. (Refresh files again in MC 5 and up each time you relaunch MC.) Rebooting your computer periodically can help, too. [ Top of Page ] 9. MASTERCOOK: Version Number?Q. How do I find out which version of MasterCook I am using? A. Select About MasterCook from the Help Menu and it will tell you the current version you are using. A. You just bought MasterCook. The box says Deluxe, but which Deluxe? The box says "4" or "5" but how up-to-date is the version vis-a-vis any patches? There is a way to find out what version of mastercook you have BEFORE you install. (You might want to take it back and buy a newer version. Or you want to avoid installing an old version on top of a new one.) Load the CD. 1) The disk has a labelname. 2) The disk comes with a file called "version.txt" -- double click it to open it. It will say something like this: Mastercook 5.03: Food & Wine TIP: To Bypass AutoPlay when inserting a cd, press and hold the SHIFT key while inserting, closing the door, and waiting for it to spin up to speed. Release the SHIFT key, and click MY COMPUTER. Right click the icon for the CD drive and select OPEN. [ Top of Page ] 10. MASTERCOOK: Why Use Buster and/or MC-TagIt?I've seen several posts asking these questions. As the author of MC-TagIt, I'll take a stab at answering. Both of these are utility programs that help to "batch process" recipe conversion and importing into MasterCook. Both are also for the PC. I understand that some people are working on a Mac version of Buster (says it on the web page - that's the extent of my knowledge). MC-TagIt is PC only. MC-Buster was written by Glen Hosey and is available at http://www.thehoseys.com/. I used Buster for years and it is an absolutely wonderful, well-written program. It reads MasterCook II through MasterCook 4.0 formats, MealMaster and a generic text format and converts them into a MasterCook MXP import file. It also provides word wrapping for the directions (that tend to get broken in email), it un-abbreviates ingredient units, capitalizes recipe titles, removes those odd "=" type characters that sometimes get added. Buster also allows you to add the name of the mailing list, name of the poster and date of the posting to the end of the recipe from the email, allowing you to track where the recipe came from. I'm sure it does more, but these are the features that I used mostly. Buster is free for the download and works with all versions of MasterCook, including MasterCook 5.x/6.x, but it does not support the new fields nor the longer field lengths, being limited to the MXP import format of the previous MasterCook versions. Buster runs in DOS but can be easily set up to run in a DOS window of Win95 or 98. MC-TagIt was written by myself and has much of the functionality of MC-Buster, but it does support the new MasterCook 5.x/6.x field and longer field length. Its output file is a .mx2 XML-tagged format that can be imported directly into MasterCook 5.x/6.x. Therefore, it is a utility for MasterCook 5.x/6.x users only. MC-TagIt is a windows program. It is available for the download from http://www.mctagit.com/MCTagit.htm. While MasterCook 5.x/6.x does have the Import Assistant, I felt there were limitations for the "power user". The Import Assistant (at least for me) works best for one or two recipes at a time. I have never gotten the auto fill to work where I did not need to move things around and make lots of corrections. I also did not like the way MasterCook 5.x/6.x assumed that my old MasterCook 4.0 RECIPE BY: field was the author (when in fact it was usually the source). MasterCook 5.x/6.x will also import directions only into the first recipe section. Why have multiple sections if MasterCook 5.x/6.x does not import into them? I saw these limitations and decided to do something about it, hence MC-TagIt. You can read more about each of these programs on their respective download site. I hope this answers the questions. Gail [ Top of Page ] 11. MASTERCOOK: What's New with SierraHome's Version 5.0?One of the major differences is the redesign of the User Interface. There are several new features and new fields. It has a RATINGS field, COPYRIGHT field, SOURCE field, ALTERNATIVE SOURCE field, and AUTHOR field, which also have more characters in them. You can choose to Export recipes in 4.0 format or 5.0 format or both or text only format. For people who make their own products, you can print your own NUTRITION FACTS labels. It supports simple MAPI so you can import files directly into MasterCook from your e-mail program. You can also send recipes through your e-mail program. It reads all the information in ALL the fields as before only some of the fields were exported. It has an Import Assistant to easily drag and drop recipes from the web or other text documents. (This works beautifully!) When importing ingredients from the Import Assistant, you don't need to import one ingredient at a time, you can select them all and click Move to Cookbook button which will paste all ingredients into the Recipe Editor line by line. I really like Import Assistant! Longer ingredient fields. Each ingredient row now has a symbol in the front of it. I is for ingredient, T is for text, S is for subtitle (such as filling, crust, etc), and R for recipe. These tell MasterCook what to do when analyzing a recipe for nutritional values. You can embed a recipe within another. For instance, if you have a cake recipe with an ingredient listed (which will have the R symbol for recipe at the start of the ingredient row) as Paul's Chocolate Frosting, you can now double-click on it, and it will open up the Paul's Chocolate Frosting recipe. You can also export embedded recipes. You can resize the columns by dragging the column to the size you want. The direction section now has different cells, so you can easily number each step in the directions and insert your own picture to that step. You can add your own videos to your recipes. It can now read many different picture formats such as .bmp, .jpg, .png, etc. It has a coupon column in the shopping list. It has a new pantry feature. In the shopping list you select the items you NEED to buy rather than one's you DON'T need to buy as before. The meal planner no longer limits you to four meals a day. It comes with several menus already for some good ideas. When you are viewing the list of your cookbooks, you now see the front cover rather than the spine of the book. The bookshelf is replaced by a photo album arrangement of book covers. It has a new MasterList which is similar to Windows Explorer. It lets you see how ALL of your MasterCook files are organized and you can drag and drop such as dragging a recipe to a menu. We can sort cookbooks by collection. [ Top of Page ] 12. MASTERCOOK: What's New With SierraHome's Version 6.0?Extensive on-line help and getting started modeled on Windows 98 help outline. (The manual and the On-line Help are the same book.) Indexing of cookbooks results in extremely fast search. Expanded search is more intuitive, customizable, multiple criteria. Search by keyword, ingredient, nutritional info. We can see all the criteria we use for a search in a new "criteria search panel". Boolean, keyword searches. Conditional searches. Save the search set-ups for use again later. Ingredients from MasterCook 4 and MasterCook 5 are merged with MasterCook 6's mastercook.ing file. Nutrition: Live update - We've always been able to analyze the nutritional content of our recipes. NOW! get instant feedback when we add or change an ingredient to a recipe and/or link it. Unlink embedded recipes to exclude them from the nutritional analysis. Useful when the embedded recipe is an option. File import has smarter filters. Much better performance. Fewer crashes while importing. Import assistant. Mini-editor with drag and drop. There's also a clean up macro: flush left, trim unwanted spaces, and join short lines of directions and notes. Import Assistant's window can be enlarged; provides a larger space to edit the pre-recipe. MasterCook 6's window can be maximized and remembers we have maximum screen selected. It will not cascade if we open another window, like the nutrition tab. NOTE - Moving from version 5 to 6 is a major upgrade, defined as a release with a different major version number, such as 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, etc. Patches that will keep the version current (for example, from 5.03 to 5.05) are generally free from the web. [ Top of Page ] 13. MASTERCOOK: What's New With ValuSoft's Version 6.2?SOURCE: http://www.valusoftsupport.com/library/versionnote/MC%206_2%20bug%20fixes.html New Functionality: IMPORT/EXPORT IMPORT ASSISTANT PRINTING TOOLS INGREDIENT LIST (NUTRITION FACTS) BUG FIXES MASTERLIST RECIPE BROWSER RECIPE DISPLAY RECIPE EDIT MENUS/MEAL PLANS IMPORT/EXPORT IMPORT ASSISTANT PRINTING SEARCH SHOPPING TOOLS [ Top of Page ] 14. MASTERCOOK: What's New With ValuSoft's Version 7.0?New Features: Over 1,000 delicious new recipes contained in 2 new cookbooks - On Cooking and Food for Fifty. MasterCook Deluxe now has over 5,000 family tested recipes! Includes the Food for Fifty and On Cooking (selected chapters) text books in PDF format. View an astounding amount of cooking tips, charts, reference information, recipes, and much more! Download Recipes and Shopping lists to your PDA (Palm OS or Pocket PC). The included MasterCook software for Palm OS and Pocket PC allows you to add new, edit, and delete recipes and shopping lists. Make shopping a snap by creating one or more shopping lists and exporting them to your PDA device. Once in the store, you can sort your lists by store location and filter by have/need status - you will be in and out of the store in no time! Compress your cookbook picture files to save disk space and increase portability of your cookbooks. When browsing cookbooks for recipes, you can now filter recipes in the recipe browser by any search parameters including nutritional values, ingredients, cooking time, categories, etc. This feature will save time and headache by only displaying the kind of recipes you want to see. So if you are interested in seeing only vegetarian recipes when browsing, that is what will be shown! Easier saved search management for saving searches you use often. Executing your favorite searches are only 2 clicks away! Includes 12 predefined recipe searches for easy searching. From recipes with no meat to recipes low in fat, we've provided a base of common recipe searches. More intuitive program navigation makes getting around easier. Added ability to edit an entire field or context in the Find/Replace and Spell check screens. Ingredients with no nutritional value are highlighted in the ingredient list. Bug Fixes: Fixed the problem in that prevented the ability to create/edit category templates. The sizes of the combo boxes on the recipe browser were increased. All columns in the shopping list screen are now shown by default. The Clipart and Cookbook Covers included with previous versions of the product, are back on the CD. [ Top of Page ] 15. MASTERCOOK: What's New With ValuSoft's Version 8.0?Please see the program's help section for more details on using the new functionality in version 8. *** MASTERCOOK WEB IMPORT BAR *********************************************** MasterCook 8 includes a revolutionary new feature called the MasterCook Web Import Bar. This bar allows you to surf the web for more great recipes and simply add them to MasterCook without ever leaving your web browser! Your recipe options are endless as this new feature puts the web at your fingertips to obtain countless recipes, while still using the powerful features of the MasterCook program. The Web Import Bar integrates with Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0 or later. To begin using the bar after MasterCook is installed: 1) Open Internet Explorer ** Clicking on the “MC’ icon in the toolbar toggles the Web Import Bar open and closed. NOTE: If your MasterCook Web Import Bar does not display in your browser after clicking on the “MC’ icon after installation, you may have to reboot your computer first. *** MASTERCOOK BACKUP AND MERGE *********************************************** The Backup and Merge software included with MasterCook 8 provides an easy way to migrate your important MasterCook data files. This software has 2 distinct functions represented by 2 tabs on the main screen: Merge and Backup. 1) Merge: If you have a previous version of MasterCook (version 4.0 and later) on your computer and would like an easy way to migrate your data to the new version, use the merge functionality of this software. To start this software you can: *** E-MAIL SHOPPING LISTS ***************************************************** *** OVER 2,000 NEW RECIPES IN 8 NEW COOKBOOKS ********************************* *** NEW SIMPLIFIED CATEGORIES ********************************************** *** UPDATED INGREDIENT LIST ********************************************** *** BUG FIXES IN MASTERCOOK PROGRAM ************************************** *** BUG FIXES IN PDA FUNCTIONALITY *************************************** [ Top of Page ] 16. MASTERCOOK: What's New With ValuSoft's Version 9.0?MasterCook 9.0 Bug Fixes: FATAL CRASH: Involving Recipe Editor with decimal fractions. In MasterCook 8 open the Preferences. In the General tab Display Amounts as Decimal Places (2). Create a new recipe with an ingredient using a decimal unit of measure, i.e. 0.5 teaspoons fennel seed. Select Change Recipe Units from the Ingredient menu. Select the fennel seed ingredient. The program crashes to the Windows desktop. WEB BAR: Does not import time in hh:mm format correctly, i.e. 1:30 (1 hr 30 min) WEB BAR: Ingredients not clearing when importing a recipe without an ingredient list after importing a recipe that does have an ingredient list BACKUP & MERGE: Problems merging My Cookbook. Currently, MC will not overwrite a newer file (just installed with MC 8) with an older one (from an installed older version). But users expect that when they use Merge, their own My Cookbook from the older version will be merged -or their personalized version of a different MC cookbook. There should be a dialog box during Merge that asks if they want to use the older version of the file or the one just installed with MC 8. Furthermore, merge will not merge ANY cookbook from MC 7 if it has the same name as a cookbook installed with MC 8, even though the date stamp of the MC 7 file is newer (tested with MC 7.0 Deluxe). Added a "file overwrite" dialog to MasterCook 9.0 that fixes this problem SPELL CHECK DEFAULT SETTINGS: When MC ships, ALL fields should be check marked to SpellCheck (people keep missing the Options button and think MC is deficient because it doesn't check Ingredients field). BACKUP & MERGE: Merging ingredients. Selecting "No to All" causes problems. INSTALLATION: Registry keys and start menu entries are sometimes left behind when uninstalling. RECIPE BROWSER: Filter recipes shows all recipes when it should show none. When we are viewing an opened cookbook and FILTER RECIPES BY something and it finds nothing, instead of it displaying no recipes, it displays them all. If it doesn't find any recipes by that criteria, then it should show no recipes at all. [ Top of Page ] 17. WINDOWS: Arranging Windows' WindowsIf you have many windows open and it's all a-clutter, and some windows are pushed off center-screen so that you cannot see the title bar, Windows' task bar can help restore things. 1) Right click a blank space on the task bar and select one of the options: a) Minimize all. Then open the window you want from the task bar. b) Cascade all windows. [ Top of Page ] 18. WINDOWS: Basic Computer ProceduresNeed a reminder or step-by-step on working with your computer, like how to copy a file? One good place to start is your own computer's help file. In Windows, for example, go to Start > Help. These websites also have useful information on beginner, intermediate, and advanced computer topics. http://www.ehow.com/home/home.jsp http://www.newbie.org/ [ Top of Page ] 19. WINDOWS: Copying Files Off of the CDDepending on your operating system you may find that files copied from a CD have their properties altered. After you have copied any file off the CD please make sure that you right click on the file you copied over and change the property from READ ONLY (indicated by a check mark). Having a read only ingredient list can cause a lot of problems within MasterCook. You do NOT need to have a checkmark in Archive.[ Top of Page ] 20. WINDOWS: How to Compact Email MailboxesYou've heard us mention COMPACTING the mailboxes before using MasterCook to read the mailbox and import recipes. Compacting recovers "deleted" space. The messages are in a queue. When we delete the third message, it is marked "deleted" and hidden from our view. It doesn't automatically tighten up the ranks and squeeze out the hole between message 2 and 4. Compacting does. It gets rid of that residual space. It does it by rewriting the mailbox so that all messages are contiguous. It's important to compact often. It can make your email program work more efficiently. It recovers wasted hard disk space. Here's how to compact email folders for various email programs. If your program is not listed, let us all know how to compact it. AOL: Click "My Files," and, in the Personal Filing Cabinet, press "Compact PFC." Even though AOL'ers can't import directly from their mailboxes, taking care of your "Personal Filing Cabinet" can keep your program from becoming corrupt -- stay online so you can collect more recipes! Those using AOL should clean out their saved e-mail messages periodically by deleting them from their Personal Filing Cabinet and then compacting. Too many saved message can result in erratic behavior of the whole program (voice of sad experience speaking here ) You can archive copies of your e-mail if you wish. In the PFC, right-click the mail folder and choose "Save Folder as," then direct it to save in another location on your hard drive, etc. You can then open AOL (you don't have to be online) and use File > Open to open that folder and use it just as though it were your "active" PFC. Caution: Before deleting mail from your active PFC, close *all* open PFC windows, use File > Open to reopen your saved archive, and spot-check to be sure that the messages saved properly. You will not be warned if your Mail folder is too big to fit on the save media you have chosen (if to want to save on a floppy, for example). EarthLink 5.0: Click the "MailBox" menu and select "Compact Folders". Eudora pro: Select "Special" from the menu, "Compact Mailboxes" or click the status bar of an open mailbox, the area that has 3 numbers on it. When the numbers are bold, the mailbox needs compacting. Example: [86/170k/24k] -- that's 86 messages taking 170k of disk space, 24k are empty records. When it is compact, the last number will be 0k Microsoft Outlook Express (Windows): Click the "File" menu, select "Folder", and then select "Compact All Folders". Microsoft Outlook Express (Macintosh): Click the "Tools" menu, select "Compact", and choose "All Local Folders". (If you use Outlook Express 5, hold down your "Option" key as you launch the program. Keep the key pressed until you see the message, "Would you like to compact the database?" Then click "Yes".) Netscape Messenger (Windows): Click the "File" menu and select "Compress Folders" or "Compact Folders". Netscape Messenger (Macintosh): Select a folder you want to compact. Then, click the "File" menu and select "Compress This Folder" or "Compact This Folder". [ Top of Page ] 21. WINDOWS: Keeping Windows Drivers CurrentWhy is it important to keep mouse, display and printer drivers current? Here are a few reasons: 1. Bug Fixes. New device drivers fix problems and address compatibility issues. Some of the problems caused by driver bugs can be subtle. Often display problems and system divide by zero problems can be "fixed" simply by updating drivers. 2. Performance. New drivers can performance better and can provide changes that were too late to be boxed when the printer, mouse, monitor, cd-rom, or scanner shipped. 3. New features. Your current driver may not be taking full advantage of your hardware's capabilities. 4. Cheaper than replacements. Keeping the investment up-to-date costs time. But the drivers are usually free for the download. Where can we find new drivers? Visit the manufacturer's website. Look for a support or downloads page. [ Top of Page ] 22. WINDOWS: MasterCook and Windows XPWe've heard from quite a number of people who have installed MasterCook (various versions) on their XP computers and have reported that the program works just fine. INSTALLATION ISSUES Be sure to turn off ANTIVIRUS and other running programs before installing. Be sure to say NO when the MC 4 installer asks to do a system test. For more info see here: Software Installation Guidelines for Windows Users. That discussion includes tips on installing older 16 bit programs and those that require 256-color and/or 640x480 resolution support enabled, such as MasterCook 4 and below. Additional tips on compatibility issues in installing are found in these discussions/articles: WIN XP: Compatibility Issues POST-INSTALL ISSUES IF, after following the instructions above, you are still having problems with running your program, first make sure that you are NOT using a "Limited User Account." See the Microsoft Knowledge Base entry: Certain Programs Do Not Work Correctly If You Log On Through a Limited User Account. IF you still have a problem and you are using MasterCook 6 you should consider obtaining and applying the Windows XP Application Compatibility Update available from Microsoft. MS describes it as "a package of software updates that address common application issues, helping Windows XP either to support these applications or helping to avoid common issues users may experience with these applications" [including MasterCook Suite 6.0 (Sierra On-Line, Inc.)]. For more information on the compatibility update from MS, see http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;308381 PRINTING IF you have problems printing, be sure you have installed a local printer on the machine you are trying to print from, whether or not a printer is physically attached to that machine, and select it as the default printer before attempting to print. See 22. Win NT/2000 -- Printer Recognition. IF you have problems printing, be sure you have obtained and installed XP drivers from your printer manufacturer. The drivers that install automatically with XP may not support anything but basic printing. Without the proper drivers, you may not be able to edit your print design or print the way you like. Some printer manufacturers have stated that drivers for Win 2000 are appropriate for using in XP, so you may want to try installing those drivers. But your printer manufacturer is where you need to go for that information. [ Top of Page ] 23. WINDOWS: Print Selected Text From a Web PageGreat tip from the Call for Help Show on ZDTV. When all you want is the recipe or cooking tip from a web page, simply print a selection. EXAMPLE: [ Top of Page ] 24. WINDOWS: Tips To Keep Your Computer Running WellThings that I do regularly to keep my machine(s) running well. 1. Regularly purge Temporary Internet Files (TIF) and History. Both Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator have provisions for this, and if the files get too big, they WILL slow your machine down, even if it doesn't crash. 2. Empty the recycle bin regularly. Amazing how much stuff sometimes piles up there. 3. At least once per week, delete all .tmp files. A quick way to do this is click Start>Find>Files or Folders, and for a search string, use *.tmp. This is a wildcard search and will turn up any file with that extension on the searched drive. They can be deleted from the search results window, and should Windows be using any of them, you will not be allowed to delete them. 4. Defrag as often as necessary. I do so each weekend, running from SafeMode. Even with 6+ and 5+ gig drives, when it is done weekly, and from SafeMode, it takes less than an hour. Select Start>Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Defragmenter. 5. Run ScanDisk often also. I usually run this one from MS-DOS, so there is nothing to write to disk during the scan, causing it to restart. ScanDisk should NOT be run from SafeMode, but works fines from MS-DOS. If you have persistent problems, do a surface scan. This takes some time, but will turn up problems that don't show on a regular scan. 6. Get an antivirus program AND KEEP THE DAT FILES UP TO DATE!! 7. Many people allow much too much to be loaded at startup. Best is to limit what is loaded at launch to what you KNOW you will use each time you bring up the machine, and load anything else as required. Then when finished, close the program. When the machine is running, do a Ctrl+Alt+Delete and you will see a list of what is currently running on your machine. Some of these things are required by the Operating System, but most likely some aren't. If you recognize things you don't need, find out why they are being loaded. Check Start>Programs>Startup, and if there is anything in there that you don't want loaded each time, delete the shortcut. Some programs load at start but are not in the startup folder. If you have one of these, take a look at the options or preferences within the program; there may be something checked to load it at the start. 8. One last anti crash item: MEMORY, MEMORY, MEMORY. With today's memory hog programs, the absolute bare minimum is 32 MB, 64 much preferred and I love my 128 MB. 9. SURGE SUPPRESSOR! Don't waste your money on one of the $7.95 specials; this is one thing where you get what you pay for. Go with APC or another reputable manufacturer who guarantees to fix your machine if it is zapped while using their product, and spend the $20 to $30 for a good one. Better still blow $80 and get a UPS; just make sure whatever you get also protects the phone/modem/cable/DSL hookup line too. This isn't directly MasterCook related but if your box is broke, MasterCook ain't gonna run for you! ;)) [ Top of Page ] 25. WINDOWS: What We Can do to Fix System ErrorsSystem errors generally tell us there is a device conflict that can sometimes be corrected by... 1) Rebooting Windows (perhaps several times) 2) Running MasterCook alone (without other programs loaded and waiting on the task bar). That includes browser, and ICQ and Print Artist and Crash Guard, etc. Another hog is "desktop themes" - Try running MC without one and see if it improves the performance. 3) Updating your device drivers: stay current, take advantage of their bug fixes 4) Removing a program you installed recently. See if that helps. 5) Reduce the number of fonts. Running low on resources and disk space: 6) Clean the disk of clutter. - Empty the recycle bin. 7) Check the available space on your hard drive. You can do this by double-clicking on the "My Computer" icon. Then right-click with your mouse on the "C:" drive icon and select "Properties". This will reveal a nifty pie chart that will show you how much drive space is available. If the problem persists, contact Tech. Support. [ Top of Page ] |
