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EP – you can download the entire Educational Program by clicking on the link to the left, but keep in mind:
- I am in the process of transferring many of my existing tips and pages to this offline mode. Blue Bold links should work in offline mode, while Orange Bold links require an internet connection. Regular blue underlined links or missing images on a page will often mean that I have not yet finished converting that page to offline mode. If you hold your mouse over a link your browser should show you the entire link. If it starts with http:// it means you will require an internet connection.
- Once you do download the EP, you will notice it is compressed in a .zip file. Refer to the Software and Other Pages section below if you need to unzip the file.
- If you ever do come to a weblink which requires an internet connection and you are connected to the internet, keep in mind that you can save all webpages to your computer (once they have fully loaded into your browser). Usually by pressing ctrl+s, or selecting File > Save from the menu. You can rename the webpage and store it in a special folder to help you remember what it is about. Just make sure to keep the .htm or .html at the end of the file name. Once you choose a name for your file, your browser may create a subfolder with the same name, where it will store all the pictures on the page and special formatting instructions. Most browsers will allow you to Save As, if you want to store the page without pictures, for example. “Web Page Complete” should mean it will store the pictures as well.
Printing – you can also print out these pages and distribute them freely. If you have problems with printing, let me know and I will try to think up a solution.
Third party reading – sometimes I will download other webpages and save them as compressed zip files. You can uncompress these using software from our pages (below). Usually you can right mouse click on a .zip file and choose Extract to <Directory name = name of file> from the dropdown menu. This will create a folder with the same name as the .zip file name. Inside this folder you may find various .html files. If you left mouse double click on any one of them they should open up in your browser offline. Most links found within such third party pages will probably require an internet connection to work. Folders with same name as the .html files store all the images and formatting. Links to these downloadable .zip files will always be marked orange bold (so that you know you require an internet connection). Alternatively, if you have a sporadic internet connection, you can download them all at once from here. When you find orange bold links to them from your downloaded EP, you can hold your mouse over the link to view the name of the zip file and then open it separately as explained above.
Software and Other
Pages
If some software or other package is mentioned, and to the right (in round brackets) it is explained that you can download such software from our website, you can download that from here. To get the username and password to access this folder you need to contact me.
Find Your Own
Software
If you find certain software that you think will help others, please email me so that I can update these pages, or upload the file to one of our file storage accounts. When finding your own software you will learn about many free file storage sites, such as http://rapidshare.com, where you can upload large files for free (usually you need to use Winrar [ (downloadable from our site) to break up larger files into smaller chunks – each file storage site will give you instructions as to the maximum size of these smaller chunks). Once you successfully download all the smaller chunks you need to piece them back together again (instructions on the compressed files [ page). If you find some useful software that you’d like to share with others, you can email me the exact weblinks from where you downloaded them.
There are generally two sites I like to use when I search for software or language training videos: http://thepiratebay.org/ and http://avaxhome.ws/. If you know of other useful ones, let me know so that I can share. These two work on different principles:
Pirate Bay – when searching you can select the criteria, such as Software only.
- once you have generated your list of search results, right mouse click on those which seem good and then choose Open in New Tab. In this way you will open those links in several windows/tabs. You want to examine each of them and choose the best one.
- read any other user comments and all the notes to make sure it is a good copy before you start downloading large files. What is also important is the number of seeders and leechers, as well as the date the file was uploaded. “Seeders” are computers on which the file is stored (and from where you can download them). The Pirate Bay, as many other sites, works based on the concept of Bit Torrents. A Bit Torrent is a small file which describes a certain large file, where this large file is stored on many computers. Your computer can download pieces of the large file from many computers (usually personal computers that are currently connected to the internet). If someone turns off their computer or disconnects it from the internet, it means one less “seeder”, but perhaps someone else has connected to the internet, meaning one more “seeder”. The more seeders the better, so make note of this before deciding which file to download. “Leechers” are other people who are downloading that file. Obviously, the more seeders and the least leechers the better. When downloading some large files, if you have a relatively slow internet connection you might want to download one file at a time. The more you download at once the longer each download will take. If you need to do some internet work and find your internet connection too slow because of the big files you are downloading, you can pause the download and resume later.
You will need Bit Torrent software to download such files. Through Pirate Bay you first download the Torrent file, and if you have a Bit Torrent software installed on your computer, the download will begin after you double left mouse click on the Torrent file. There are many free Bit Torrent software available (just search on google for “bit torrent software”), and the one I personally use is FlashGet [http://www.flashget.com/] . Once the download has been activated you can right mouse click on the file name (within the Bit Torrent software) to pause the download and find out information about it, such as where it is being saved.
AvaxHome – there could be many sites such as this, but they work on a slightly different principle than Bit Torrents. Bit Torrent files are small files stored on a server (such as PirateBay), which you can download and once activated downloads the big files from many personal computers. Avax files are actually stored somewhere on a server. It could be a 1.3GB movie broken up into smaller, 100MB .rar files. You need to download each of these smaller files and then piece them back together, as explained on the Compression [ page. Therefore, for a 1.3GB movie broken up into 100MB files, you would need to download 13 files. The Avax page only stores information about the file and from where to download it, but because of copy infringement sometimes these files are removed from the file storage folder. Once again you want to read the comments and information about the file before you start such large downloads.
Once you have chosen the file you would like to download, you should see the download links (such as the 13 files stored somewhere on the RapidShare server). You need to download each of the small chunk files, one at a time. If you have a paid account with the relevant file storage server (such as Rapidshare), they will let you download at faster speeds, or several files at once. But unless you have a superfast internet connection, I do not find the paid download faster than the regular, free download. For the free download, all these file storage sites tend to work the same way, whereby they try to convince you of the fantastic benefits of being a paid member. If you are a free member, you usually have to press the Slow Download button, then wait perhaps 60 seconds (you will see a countdown time once you press on the download button). They are only trying to make it inconvenient for you in the hope that you will become a paying member. Once you have downloaded a smaller chunk file, as a free member, you will usually have to wait around 30 minutes before downloading another file. You will always be informed of this whenever trying to download another file. Once you get used to how each site operates, you will find that these procedures are not so inconvenient as they first appear.
Many times the user who has uploaded the smaller chunk files stores them on “mirror sites”. For example, they may have stored the 13 files on Rapidshare, but ALSO on another file storage site. This is useful because you can download, for example, the first file from one server, and the second file from the other server. While the first server makes you wait 30 minutes before you can download another file, you can download the other file from the other server, and then jump back to the first server to download the third file.
Searching
Whether using Piratebay, Avaxhome or some other service, because these downloads can be very large you want to do your research properly so as not to waste your time. Lets say you want to download Corel, which is my favourite graphics program (in time I will write extensive instructions for this, and perhaps make it available for download). First you could research it on google to see if it is what you really want to download. Perhaps search some forums to see what others have said about the program.
Once you decide you like a program, the version is also important. For example, later versions often have a higher demand on your computer. Go to the software producer’s website to find the “required hardware” for that version. Perhaps your computer is not strong enough, or does not have enough RAM. Refer to the Computer Tips section to help you understand the limitations of your computer.
You can search google to first find the software you want, then use one of the above sites to download the particular software. Whenever searching, the choice of words is important and perhaps my using search engines [ page will help you. For example, lets say you are looking for English language courses. These may be in the form of videos, or software which runs on your computer. In Avax or Piratebay, you might try searching for “teach yourself English” or “learn English”, and then select both software and video, or just software or just video. After experimenting for a while you will understand how these systems work and, in time, learn to quickly find whatever you need. Don’t let yourself be intimidated!
For many people using computers can be intimidating indeed. But it is like a language – the more (words) you learn the faster you will continue to learn. You will start to feel more comfortable with your “new language” and speak faster and faster, and learn faster too. You just need to get over the initial hump. Other times some people are simply “technically hopeless”. You can ask others who are more technically adept to help you become familiar. Using the above sites can also be intimidating. Over time I might try to make simple pictorial tutorials to help newbies, or perhaps one of you may apply your new webpage making skills and help me with this!
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