Sunday, December 20, 2015

Note taking app + more = TagSpaces


We all tend to forget. It’s part of human nature. But can we forget when we have all the technical possibilities of today? Both students and teachers have to keep in mind many things to remember. Is there a technological way to help us remember?

Yes there is! It’s open source and available for various platforms. It’s TagSpaces. One can use it just to write a simple note to remember. TagSpaces is rather unknown but powerful and feature rich app. It's not just a note taking app, but it's much more - it's a complete data management application that you can use to manage and organise the files on your computer. As the name suggests, you can tag all kind of files for quick finding. 


If you want an introduction just click here. If you want to download it, than go here. More information can be found here. If you want to use it on your mobile phone, than go here.

TagSpaces can open all kind of files be it image or PDF. It can also take quick notes. A nice GUI (graphical user interface ie you can clearly see what it does) tops all the features.



Monday, December 7, 2015

Playing all sorts of music or video files


A teacher or a student, can make use of audio and video files nowadays in class. It's not the first time that one has a video that one downloads from the internet or get it from another kind of resource, but it won't play on his computer! This happens with video files but especially with music, where one encounters several music formats.

Is there a free and open source player which plays practically all types of audio and video files? Yes there is! Just try Smplayer. It is available for windows and linux platforms. If one is looking for help to do the first steps, than one should visit this page. If you want to see how many formats of files are supported, than one should visit this page. The FAQ (Frequently asked questions) section is here. The forum, (the place where people ask all sorts of questions), is here.  Enjoy!



Monday, November 23, 2015

Gimp - The Image Manipulation Program


Photo taking is becoming a habit for many people since it is readily available on mobile phones. Most people like photos as we are living in the “selfie era”. Teachers and students too are part and parcel of today's society.

Now when it comes to class, both teachers and students would like to change some aspects of the photo. They need an open source program which is not difficult to learn yet it makes it possible to manipulate photos according to their educational needs.

A picture says a million words somebody said one day.  They are a wonderful tool in the classroom. An example would be that of a conversation starter or else to help students write in a different way ie a series of photos from different angles of the same object would help them to avoid repeating the same ideas or sentences. A photo of a strange animal or plant would obviously break down any misunderstanding and would help the teacher immensely. A photo can help the students understand people of far away countries together with their lives, culture and experiences.

Teachers do understand that most resources did not originate from educational spheres so it's understandable the need to tune them in to educational needs. Hence image manipulation comes in very handy.
We present gimp, the program which has been going on for these last 20 years!!! If you need tutorials, documentation and to download it, one finds everything in one page. Just click on the link below.


Sunday, November 8, 2015

Gourmet Recipe Manager: a Recipe-Organiser


Today it's the turn of those students studying Home Economics' special section: Preparing Food. At times one has some ingredients and wants to know if it's possible to prepare some kind of food. Or how about knowing what to buy before preparing a particular kind of food? Or how about calculating the nutritional value of food?

Others have already collected some recipes, could they be incorporated into one program? Or could one classify his/her recipes in a different way? Those who are living in the fast lane would like to find the essential recipe with the least amount of time, is it possible?

Well, all this is possible because of Gourmet Recipe Manager which is a recipe-organizer available for Windows, Mac and Linux. Practically it allows you to collect, search, organize, and browse your recipes. Want to have a try? Well go here to download. If you would like some information about the program, than go here. Do you have more questions? Well go here

 

Sunday, October 25, 2015

Free Interior Design Program


Students would like to design their own room. Maybe they have ideas about their school. They don't want to become architects but they have a special love for design. Well, we are providing another free and open source software in order to fulfill their dreams.

Sweet Home 3D is a free interior design application that helps you draw the plan of your house, arrange furniture on it and visit the results in 3D. It should fulfill their dreams. It's another asset for teachers teaching design and technology. If you wish to download it, click here. For videos and other help click here. For some quick photos about results that could be obtained by using Sweet Home 3D, just click here.

Sunday, October 11, 2015

Tux Math


It has been the experience of many teachers that when they distribute math papers most students' face turn white. Why is it so hard to use numbers? Well, we have a partial solution by presenting math in a different way. TuxMath is where mathematics meets the arcade.
In this shooting game, asteroids threaten friendly penguin Tux. His ammunition? Mental arithmetic! The flying moon rocks are actually space division, multiplication and subtraction, and by finding the answer, you destroy them, and saving the penguin igloos from the devastating impact.
TuxMath is an open source, free game whose difficulty is appropriate for students from elementary to high school. It offers dozens of missions that require calculations that get more and more complicated, ending up with some really tricky stuff, like the division of negative numbers.
TuxMath also offers a second, more advanced mode, where the asteroids are fractions you destroy by finding their common denominator. TuxMath is fun and well-designed and bridges the gap between educational and fun. Who said that fractions have to be boring?!
Tuxmath is available for windows, mac and linux PCs. One can download it from here. Tutorials are found here.



Sunday, September 27, 2015

Stellarium


It's incredible the number of open source products which could be used in class. One of them is Stellarium. Students need to view and access sources themselves. In this case stellarium proves to be a very good product. Students may view stars at the comfort of their homes.

In technical words it's a planetarium for your computer. It shows a realistic sky in 3D, just like what you see with the naked eye, binoculars or a telescope. It is being used in planetarium projectors. Just set your coordinates and go.
You may download it from here. If you want to use it on your android mobile phone, download it from the google store. Mac/Windows users download it from here.

Sunday, September 13, 2015

Free Mind - Mapping software


Teachers and/or students have experienced the so called difficult lessons. Both of them try to get the message across. Yet the student does not feel so confident that he or she has understood exactly what the teacher is trying to explain. On the other hand, students do not learn with the same method. Some students like visual explanations.

With this in mind, we are trying to focus on mapping. Mapping is an easy way to make difficult lessons easier. Other times it could be that the lesson is easy but it's not so easy for the student to understand the big picture. Here again mapping comes to the rescue.

One can use various colours or bubbles in order to make oneself understood better. It's a very good tool to be used for brainstorming before writing exercises. If you wish to download it, just click here. As usual its open source and it's available for linux, windows and mac computers. If you need more information just click on these links below: 


 



Link 3. (download)

Link 4. (video tutorial) 

 


Sunday, August 30, 2015

Xournal



Teachers and students would sometimes miss writing with their own bare hands in the computer era. Well unfortunately sometimes people have interpreted the coming of the computer as the destruction of the old ways. There is no truth in this as there is no single formula, in teaching, which would solve all problems! The new ways should compliment the old ones and not bury them at the cemetery.

How about writing with your hands on your computer?! Well the program Xournal uses a pen which might be moved with your hands as if you are writing on paper!! Imagine working on a pdf file using your own handwriting and then saving it as a pdf too! It's possible in Xournal. One can use it when working with past papers for example.

It's not just for writing in your own unique way, but there are many more advantages. One can use a highlighter; text tool; ruler; rectangle or lasso selection etc. One can add layers, pages or backgrounds. For more information just check the manual pages

 

Sunday, August 16, 2015

Saving all your files....!


How many times a virus gets into your computer and you discover that you need to format everything?! It's a nightmare as you have hundreds of files which you need for your school! Your technician tells you that all your files have been infected….so practically you have to throw them away. How are you going to write all those files again? It's plenty of time...plus you don't remember what you have written days, weeks or months ago in all the files.

Sometimes it's about programs that you have installed but have unfortunately stopped working. How about having them running again? In a computer there are so many things that you need to record that an external disk won't record everything. Sometimes everything is working ok, you do an update and all sorts of problems pop up. You wish to go back one day, so that your pc will be healthy again.

Is there an easy way? Yes there is. It's open source and available for various operating systems. It's Areca. It copies everything (including hidden files which normally are not copied when copying to an external Hard Disk).

Here is a tutorial of how to set it up for the first time. Just follow the screenshots step by step and you're there. The beauty of it is when you need to recover just a file or two (so there is no need to install again programs or files), you'll just find it in the recovery part. It has saved people a lot of time. I think it would win a prize for the best program which saves the most time (and frustrations!!) to busy people.

Another big plus is that the next time you'll do a backup, there is no need to start from scratch! You only need to increment (update) your first backup! It's so fast. If you wish, in Linux OS, you can set a time and date to do the backup automatically! Now you have another program which sets your mind at rest when something happens to your pc or laptop. 

For safety and privacy concerns, one can encrypt the copied files as the external Hard Disk might get stolen or lost. 

For a more detailed information about the program, you might visit this link.
 

Sunday, August 2, 2015

PeaZip.....File compressor and Free Archiver


How about sending a large number of photos to your friends/students/teachers etc.? Most of the time, people have problems in sending photos over the internet. On the other hand, sometimes we receive packets, from others, which cannot be seen unless they are unpacked! In other technical words, they are compressed (or zipped). How can one unzip it?

One good open source program is PeaZip. Besides the usual advantages of using open source, there is the added advantage that this program is capable of understanding several file formats. So forget about the problem of receiving a file and cannot open it just because it is not compatible with your system.

Another added advantage is that one of them is that one can encrypt files with PeaZip too! So again, one can forget about security problems when sending an exam paper or other sensitive school material (such as assignments by students) across the internet.

It can optimize the compression of photos (some other programs make a mess of your photos!!). Another asset would be that of splitting and joining your large files (we blogged about JSplit in a previous publication).

If that is not enough, well it can backup your files too!! Many worry when formatting the hard disk because of losing all the important material. How can one recover those infinite number of hours preparing lessons or doing assignments or papers? Well, PeaZip can be used for that purpose too. It's a super program! If you need any FAQ (frequently asked questions), well the link is here. Extra help may be found here.


Monday, July 20, 2015

Low-Cost Multi-Touch Whiteboard


The interactive whiteboard is fast becoming part and parcel of the classroom. As usual the student who wants to learn and practice at home is at crossroads. He would like to practice what he/she sees at school but the high prices of an interactive whiteboard plus the software, are not student friendly!

We always insist that the lesson in a class is not enough. Some students need extra time in order to master the lesson. Besides, with the noise, interruptions etc. in a class, some students would like to revise the lesson in the quiet and peaceful settings of their own house.

Another important point is that the new format of the lesson is fast changing. The lesson is being done at home whilst the time in class could be devoted to personal questions and problems. Now if we wish to make this come true, one has to think of how to bring the interactive board to each student.

Today, proudly we are presenting a low-cost multi-touch Whiteboard. Besides the physical aspect of the challenge, we presenting the software too. Now in this regard it is very important to have open source software as these technological gadgets are changing practically every day. In a closed source software, one has to wait for the company (if they'll accept the challenge after all), to do the necessary changes. In the open source environment, one can change the program himself/herself. It is available for Windows, Macintosh and Linux OS.










Sunday, July 5, 2015

Open Culture


People expect to have a good service or product at a price. In other words, something free should not be of high quality. Well that's because money has changed our lives so much, that we expect to pay and be paid for any services or products provided.

Have a look at what your parents did for you. Can you equate their work with a sum of money? Does it mean that because it was freely given, it was of a low quality?

Now there are people in society who would like to share their work for free. This happens for various reasons especially when it comes to education. Maybe they believe that some works of art, projects etc. should be shared as they belong to the world's heritage. Others believe that if we start sharing, other people might join the group and share as well. In the end everybody will be a winner.

Imagine if one does a wonderful project. He or she puts all his/her ideas. They are the ideas of just one single person. Each and every person is gifted. On the other hand, each and every person is limited. Now imagine if he/she makes it open for all. Another person comes in and adds more ideas. Most often it's not just one person who joins the group. There would be hundreds or thousands! Look at how many wonderful ideas there are now compared to the original project where only one person put the ideas! It is the philosophy of the more, the merrier!

Today we wish to share a web-page which has thousands of links to other pages where people can access for free, several educational pages or courses. They are all free. There are so many subjects covered that it's very difficult to give a summary of all of them. Just click on the link and enjoy!


Sunday, June 21, 2015

Open Teacher



It is a small program which helps teacher revise some concepts, ideas, vocabulary or past lessons done with students. It helps students to revise their lessons too! It could be used by both of them. The questions could be asked in a random manner so it would discourage anybody from knowing beforehand the following question!

If you want to download a copy just click here, for tutorials to overcome the initial fear of trying a new program, click here. FAQ (Frequently asked questions) section, just click here. If you're interested to see how others view the program than go here. Another opinion is found here.

The advantages of the program are several. It can read several formats of files (29). One can create a topography or media lesson. One can create a lesson from a picture, any other file or from the internet! There is typing tutor where both teachers and students could improve their speed of writing in a computer file. It could be installed on windows, mac and linux operating systems. 

 

Sunday, June 7, 2015

Calibre : Reading, writing and changing ebooks



Teachers and students have a common tool: books. Does it mean that although we use computers/tablets/mobile phones we are going to throw away books? Surely NOT. Today we are lucky to have a bigger choice. No one is against reading books the old way (ie tangible one where one flips pages with his own hands).

Nowadays we have more choice in the sense we can download books unto our electronic gadget without the need to go outside to a library or shop to buy it. Some students coming from poor families or families who don't wish to spend their money on educational books, now can download some books for free! One can visit the guthenberg site in order to find around 48,000 FREE e-books. No student can claim that all books are boring. Having such a big online library, there is at least one good book for everybody!

We can change the format of the letters (for dyslesic, or students with a poor eye sight). We can change the format to fit our electronic gadget (mobile phone, pc or tablet). One can write on the book. In fact some teachers use it to let students comment when reading a book. At the end the teacher has the comments of all students on one book! This was not possible on physical books as it was heavily prohibited to write on books. Students can see comments made by other students. Peer to peer learning is another wonderful tool for students made possible by electronic books.

Another hidden advantage is that teachers nowadays can have a proof if students have opened or not the books because each comment will have a time date! This was surely not possible with the old system!

The biggest advantage is surely the fact that when we read educational books we meet new, strange or undecipherable words. In the old times, we had either to guess the meaning from the general sense of the sentence or else go for another book....dictionary. Now one needs to press the word and up comes the definition!! It's that simple. Now books have become easier.

Our aim today is to introduce another wonderful free source program which can be used in windows, mac, android or linux! It's called calibre. It has all the features mentioned above and more.

As usual we are providing some tutorials in case our readers have some teething problems.

Tutorial 1 (FAQ)
Tutorial 2 (video)
Tutorial (for android)
Tutorial 3 (news feeds)

Sunday, May 24, 2015

Open Street Map


All people do look for a particular place, address or a historical building. How do you go from point A to point B? Teachers and students too need a map from time to time. Teachers would like to teach their students some practical hints how to find a place in a short time. What program do they need to use?  

As usual we go for open source programs where students and teachers can change. That's the beauty of open source! We are providing some quick help in order to master the program which should be quite easy. There are places where one can influence the program especially when it comes to jotting down some interesting places! Please do contribute with ideas in order to make it better! See the links below: 

beginner's guide, all written down.

if you want to start an account and contribute to the openstreetmap and how to collect and edit data.

lots of new concepts for everybody
  
video tutorial 1

video tutorial 2






Sunday, May 10, 2015

Editing PDF files


Most teachers and students use pdf documents. Teachers do share and download important files as pdf. What's a pdf file? It's a portable document file. Some teachers like it because the student receives it as it is. Other formats may change when the student opens them on his electronic device, especially changing from a pc to mobile gadgets!

On the other hand, what can a teacher do when he/she has a pdf file but wishes to do some changes? Teachers do editing all the time as they see the students' reaction to their personalised notes. They may change some words or phrases or re-write the file completely.

Today we present Master PDF editor. Teachers and students need it especially when presenting some important information and at the last minute they see some mistakes or wish to change some parts of it.

Master PDF editor is available for Mac, Windows and Linux operating systems. In other words it's cross-platform. If one prefers YouTube tutorials than one must visit this link. Others might prefer the official manual of the program

 

Wednesday, April 29, 2015

Recording and interviewing students or other people


Owing to family health problems I had to delay my update of my blog by three days. Well here I am. Talking and recording one's voice is so important in class. Students would like to hear their own voices. They would like to record important interviews, some important dialogues. Teachers too would like to record some basic instructions for students.

As usual, both teachers and students would like something to use which is super easy to use and which is free. We present audacity. If you need to download it press here.

On the internet, when one wishes to master a program, we look for a tutorial. Here are some tutorials: YouTube tutorials; Other tutorials and written tutorials. If you are not completely satisfied, you can always google for more information on the internet. But the best tutorial is you when you start practising and learning by committing some mistakes!!


Sunday, April 12, 2015

Sending large files over the internet


A challenge faced by both students and teachers is that of sending large files. The email service puts a limit to your attachment. One cannot send a very large file. Is there a solution? Yes there is. Just break up the large file into smaller pieces. The one receiving your small pieces of the original file can simply put them all together….no damage whatsoever to your original file!!! I've tried it with an operating system!!! Now an operating system is quite heavy and risky, yet it worked for me perfectly well. So it should work for you too. Obviously the program is free and open source. It works in windows, mac and linux...so what are you waiting for?!

The link to the program is here. You press split when you want to put it into smaller pieces and join when you receive them. You can determine the size of the file. You can try several sizes. Obviously instead of one email, you have to send several ones. But you'll be happy to communicate in this way as otherwise you have to be physically present in order to share some big files. Enjoy!


Monday, March 30, 2015

OH.....I forgot my password.....!!!!


One of the most common operations done on any computer, tablet, mobile phone etc....is the use of passwords. How many times we hear a distress call from students and teachers…..oh I forgot my password! That means that the teacher/student has been locked out from any services offered by a particular website.

One used to write a password or two on a piece of paper. In many experiences the paper would get lost. Besides the problem of forgetting where that blessed paper is, one does not like the idea of writing so many passwords on a piece of paper. 

 

Is there a solution? Yes there is. We are of the opinion to use a password manager. The password manager keeps all your passwords in one place. One has to remember just one single password ie to open the password manager. One such manager is the Keepassx Manager. This is not an online manager where security is not 100%. This keeps the file with all the passwords on one's computer only. There is no other hidden file put online or somewhere else. The file cannot be opened by any other program.

The advantage is that one can take the file (with all the passwords) on a pendrive and use it on another computer (provided that keepassx is installed on that computer too).

Other advantages are: if you want a secure password and don't know how to create one, especially a very secure one, keepassx will generate one for you. Most people get annoyed writing a secure password because they would have to type it all over again every time they need to enter a particular website. Well with keepassx one can simply copy and paste! That's all.

Most people use names, phone numbers etc as passwords. For those who care about security they would opt for a more secure password where a mixture of numbers, letters, small and capital ones are used. An example would be:
sGkREqL8fP2cUSMfDv2jd9CAzWScowgDvrWgnkXFgBUuNtpMeHDnDh
How's that for security?! As one can see, keepassx can generate very secure passwords. One can generate a smaller password too.

Another tedious problem especially for teachers and students would be, if there is somebody behind my back who is overlooking what I'm doing, he/she might copy or remember my password!! With keepassx they just see a series of dots....so one does not need to worry at all. If you want to see more screenshots then go to this webpage.


Please remember that if you write your email address exactly at the top of this page, you will get an email every time we publish a new article. So why don't you write your email now?!

Sunday, March 15, 2015

Recording your Desktop


One of the most creative way of explaining things is to record your desktop i.e. the teacher wants to be very practical by showing the students a demonstration about the lesson. This is because the material found on the internet is too in general. The teacher knows his class, so he has to speak in a way that his students understand. The students, watching and listening to their own teacher explaining things may find it more user friendly. In other words, even if the teacher says the same things all over again, the fact that they see and hear their own teacher, works wonders! Recording your desktop gives a personal touch to teaching in this computer related era!

There is no expensive material involved, just a webcam, a microphone and a simple, free open source program which everybody knows about – VLC. As with other software, the teacher needs some time to practice and feel at home with this software. Maybe some soft music playing in the background would make it ideal for the students. Ideally for the teacher is to play some tutorials in order to feel more comfortable in using this software program. There are some You Tube tutorials as well.

Those using Linux, have a large variety such as: vokoscreen; wink; recordmydesktop; XvidCap; Istanbul; ffmpeg (mac/windows too); kazam

 

Sunday, March 1, 2015

Teachers Securing [Encrypting] their emails containing exam papers


It's not the first time that some students get hold of exam papers before actually sitting for exams!! Most teachers think about securing hard copies. But do they ever think about securing soft copies? Most teachers still don't know about cyber security. They still don't know how to make emails and documents safe from anyone who wishes to get in between the sender and the receiver!

Teachers do need to consult before submitting the last edit of an exam paper. They can't all be in the same room all the time, especially if they are preparing the exam papers at home. In many common cases they have some difficulties and maybe they wish to discuss a particular issue or some issues with another teacher.

Most people now use an online services for email, such as Yahoo/Google/Hotmail etc….Today we wish to help most of our readers in securing their mail services. Down below there are some links which should help them.

Link 1 (official help site of Mailvelope [the addon on Firefox and Chrome which adds Mailvelope to their browser)

Link 2 (video + some more explanation why people should encrypt their emails)

Monday, February 16, 2015

A free alternative to Office - LibreOffice



If you wish be informed every time there is an update to this blog, just write your email address at the top of the page. 


 One of the most used programs is surely 'Office'. Knowing that most students have financial difficulties to buy this and other programs, we offer a free and open source program – LibreOffice.

 LibreOffice (LO), does not only provide the same services but more. Have a look at the drawing features where it offers a program for drawing and not just a few features for drawing! See Illustration 2.

Mathematics teachers should be proud as they have their own program in LO too. Have a look at illustration 3.

I know what you're thinking….but all my friends use Microsoft Office. How can I work on the same files? Yes of course you can! When working in LO one can save in various formats and you can still read files of other programs such as office. See illustration 1.


Illustration 1

Illustration 2

Illustration 3




















Sunday, February 1, 2015

Saving your favourite websites (bookmarks)


Many teachers are busy preparing their lessons which includes bookmarking interesting educational sites. They never give a thought of copying all their material onto a pen drive or a portable hard disk. All of a sudden they see the blue screen of death or a virus on their laptops….and they start to panic when they realise that their work could disappear forever. Here we are giving some very easy steps to follow in order to copy the bookmarks found on your browser.
This should be an incentive to use free and open source programs which are able to stand up such threats especially in the life of a teacher where students are encouraged to share their presentations in front of the class. Consequently the threat of getting a virus is much higher than in the life of other people using the internet. 


Firefox

Go to bookmarks (top of the browser)
Show all bookmarks
Click on Import and Backup (very top)
Click on Backup...
Select where to put the file….
or you can use:
Export Bookmarks to HTML (I prefer this one!)

Chrome

In the top-right corner of the browser window, click the Chrome menu (you have sort of 4 horizontal lines)
Select Bookmarks,
then Bookmark Manager
Click on the Organize menu in the manager
Select Export bookmarks

How to Import

If you want to import them into another computer, then you only need to follow the same instructions for both browsers. This time, select import instead of export.

Sunday, January 25, 2015

Dual Boot: Having both Linux and Windows on the same computer!


Using a Linux Live DVD or Linux on a pendrive has its own advantages. But for obvious reasons one cannot have all the advantages! Hence for some people they might test it by installing it on their hard drive. Let me put it in a very simple way: Nobody is forcing you to install anything.

Linux users do not force you to install Linux but they do make you aware of choice. Most computer users have only seen one operating system and they are totally unaware of so many choices when it comes to computing!!

Secondly, it does not mean that you have to take away your windows section! You can dual boot so you can have both windows and linux installed on the same machine. That's our study for today. The advantage is that if you're using linux but you still feel that you should use your favourite programs, you can go to the windows section and work normally! So in that case you'll be using the best of two systems: Linux and Windows! In other words you're choosing what to use which is super fantastic!

Now obviously, where do you start? I shall first put a link for those who are using windows 7 (as it's more popular). The link is very user friendly as it has ample screenshots where it tells you what to do: step by step. Link 1

The following link is for those who are using windows 8. Link 2 In most cases, Windows 8 has what is called a secure boot, intended for rootkit viruses. Well you have to disable it in order to install Linux. Don't you worry. Here is an easy guide on how to do it Link 2B. Another feature which one should disable is the fast boot up. Just go to this link 2C to solve this challenge.

The last link is simply a repetition. It differs in one point only: installing Mint (Linux). Link 3

Sunday, January 11, 2015

Using a pendrive for trying out Linux !



Some laptops do not have an optical DVD read and write drive. Other ones do, but people get fed up with burning lots of DVD's. Whatever the reasons one might have, we have another solution. How about using a USB pen drive to try out Linux?

This will then allow you to have some practice with your new operating system (OS) before any changes take place on your pc!

Here comes the guide (other people have already asked for such help!) on how to use a bootable USB drive! This is the advantage of the Open Source, there is always somebody in another part of the world who has encountered the same challenge.

Guide1 This is a step by step guide using pictures. But if you still do need any other information, there are so many links to use, just in case you have any questions or difficulties. It's a compact website where everything is only a click away. As with a live DVD one has to first check the computer BIOS setting. This is the readable part which appears on the screen as soon as one fires up a pc. In the BIOS you have to make sure that your PC will boot up on the USB first and not on its hard-disk. There is some help in the previous posting about how to change the bios settings.

Guide2 This is a picture (screenshots) tutorial for those who feel a little bit more confident in hacking (personalizing) his PC, although it's quite straightforward and easy to understand.

Have fun!