Taking notes from the web
There are many ways to capture and store information from the web. For example, if I go to a recipe site on the web I can use their tools to store my flies on their website. However, I vist too may sites to find this an effective method of storing recipes!
There are many ways to capture and store information from the web. For example, if I go to a recipe site on the web I can use their tools to store my flies on their website. However, I vist too may sites to find this an effective method of storing recipes!
http://www.kraftfoods.com/kf/recipes/zesty-grilled-vegetables-52677.aspx
I can use their print
button which will reformat the page to be printed.
Just what the result will be can vary widely. On some
sites, I can choose to have the recipe print in
various sizes, with or without a picture.
Since I seek to run a
paperless house, and since my Mac does such a great
job of making files searchable, I might print a copy
to use next to the stove, but I will print the recipe
as a PDF file if I might want to use it again.
This allows me to store
individual recipes, but I often want to look at many
recipes if I am preparing menus and shopping lists.
There are several methods that can be used to store
and save recipes besides buying special recipe
software..
There are several general programs that work very
well for making a computer recipe book. My favorite
is Circus Ponies Notebook.
Although this application costs $49.95, it is a
program that I use every day. I have lots of
different notebooks and I really like the
notebook-like interface for storing and organizing
information. In fact, I own a copy for every
computer in my home and regularly give it as a
gift to friends and family.
To move the information
from the web to the notebook, I simply used Drag and
Drop. To do this, highlight the portion of the web
page that you want, then move your cursor so that it
is over text, wait about one second, click and hold
the mouse button or trackpad button, then drag it
from the web page to the page in Notebook (or a blank
document in your word processor--even TextEdit!
As you can see in the
screen shot above, I highlighted the portion of the
recipe I wanted and then used Drag and Drop to move
the selected text (and picture) into TextEdit. I got
some things I did not want (extra graphics from the
web page). My results would have been better if I had
used the Print page from the web site.
Another way to grab the
information is to drag the highlighted text directly
to your desktop. You will then have a textClipping
file with an icon similar to this.
When you double click on
the icon, a window similar to this will open. While
you can view it, rename it, use Spotlight to search
for it, and copy it to another document, you cannot
print textClippings. While some people store many
items as textClippings because they are so small, I
tend to only use them as an intermediate step in
producing some other document.
Some people have trouble
getting Drag and Drop to work. Check out my next blog
post to learn how to get the best results.
This entry evolved from a tutoring session that I did
for one of our Doctor Mac clients at Bob LeVitus
consulting. I cannot make blog entries for every
tutoring session I do, and you probably don’t
want to wait around for a blog entry to be published!
However, if you need help learning to do something on
your Macintosh, scheduling a tutorial session might
be just the thing to do! Tutoring costs $60 per hour.
While I am showing you how to do something on your
computer, we will be taking screen shots so that you
can remember what you learned!
Give us a call at 408 627-7577 if you would like to
schedule a tutoring session.
--Pat