It's faster, but Norton still no speed demon

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Better answer to fractions in Word

You really blew the answer on that one. Your suggestion will leave huge white space above the rest of the line and take a lot of extra … read more work. You might want to find someone who knows various software packages or at least can try out your answer before you publish it. ............................................................................................................................................... The better answer is really easy and probably exactly what Linda wanted. ............................................................................................................................................... The problem is that Word is set up by default to replace a few fractions as a single character. It is easy to tell it to ignore them and leave them as the typical 3 characters that are typed. ............................................................................................................................................... From the top menu, go to [Tools][AutoCorrect Options...] ............................................................................................................................................... On the [AutoFormat As You Type] tab, uncheck the Fraction item and any other settings that you want. I also recommend unchecking almost all of them. Smart quotes can cause problems if you paste things into email. Ordinals as superscript also get very small. Internet links look funny underlined and blue unless you really want to do that. The automatic lists can start attacking you in your ingredient list when it tries to use consecutive integers. Experiment with the rest. ............................................................................................................................................... Do the same thing with the items in the [AutoFormat] tab. ............................................................................................................................................... While you are there check that none of them got put in the AutoCorrect tab which will also change text as you type. If you have some common words that you don't want to type completely every time, you can create short cuts that are automatically expand your private abbreviations into small amounts of boilerplate text that you use frequently, such as *js to be expanded into "Recipe from John Smith family"

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More from Steve Alexander

Q What is the best Windows antivirus software? I have Norton Internet Security and have been using other versions of Norton for years. But I am getting sick of it slowing my PC.

DANIEL SATHER, MINNETONKA

A I had begun to feel the same way about Norton products. It appeared that, to justify annual prices of $40 (Norton AntiVirus 2010) to $100 (Norton 360 Version 3.0 Premier Edition), Symantec kept adding more functions, and that slowed down PCs.

But that may be getting better. A recent review in PC Magazine said that while Norton Internet Security had been a source of PC slowdowns in years past, it was significantly improved in the 2009 and 2010 versions. Even so, the review said that Norton Internet Security 2010 still slowed PC start-up by 36 percent. See tinyurl.com/nyj54r.

I don't recommend for-pay commercial software, but I do suggest free programs. For basic protection, which should slow your PC less than Norton (while also doing less), try the free Microsoft Security Essentials (download it at www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials) or AVG Anti-Virus Free (download it at free.avg.com/us-en/homepage). Both work with Windows XP, Windows Vista or Windows 7. Neither program has a firewall, so try the free version of the ZoneAlarm firewall (download it at tinyurl.com/5de5as).

Q I have been asked to type a cookbook with all of our family recipes, but everyone complains about my PC's tiny type size for fractions, such as 1/2 cup or ¼ cup. How can I change Microsoft Word 2003 so fractions don't automatically become hard to read?

LINDA THOMPSON,

CORAL SPRINGS, FLA.

A You can enlarge the typeface for the fractions without changing the rest of the text. At the top of your screen, Word lists the typeface you are using (Arial, Times New Roman and so on) and beside that is the type size (12 points is the default). In the text of your cookbook, define the fractions you find hard to read, then use the pull-down menu on the type size to increase the size of the fractions -- 20 points should work.

Q We can't delete e-mail from Outlook Express on our Windows XP PC. What can we do?

KRIS MOSER, DUBUQUE, IOWA

A This can happen if one of the e-mail messages you've previously deleted has had its data corrupted, or if the "deleted items" folder is full. To learn how to fix the problem, see support.microsoft.com/kb/312348.

E-mail tech questions to steve.j.alexander@ gmail.com, or write to Tech Q&A, 425 Portland Av., Minneapolis, MN 55488-0002. Include name, city and phone number.

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