Where/How to find it?

[Putershark]

As per my posting on "low cost tilt steering" Our buddy Genelie was wanting to know "Where to find it" so in a couple of pictures I wanted to take the time to help everybody find pretty much any kind of information quickly on your PC to help save on some time, money (fuel) and effort.

So in this example the tilt steering posting I made had the part number, which can make it much easier to find something. The only time this can burn up a lot of time, is if the part number is of a common sequence and as such, may be use by several industries and companies like... Oil Filters for example. So when asked in the thread where do I find it, I typed in the steering part number into the Google tool bar and hit enter.

http://www.triumphowners.net/photos/data/514/Search_0.jpg

Which then brought up this search page

http://www.triumphowners.net/photos/data/514/Search_1.jpg

Which then had the title of exactly what I was looking to find (got to love it) and when I clicked on it I had the site, cost (great for comparing prices with other sites OR your dealer) and stocking levels all in just a couple of fast clicks

http://www.triumphowners.net/photos/data/514/Search_2.jpg

Now how else can you use this tool to find stuff and save money? Well in my case, I pretty much always have a PC with high speed internet access up and running in my face all day long... Let's say I get a call on my desk or cell phone and I do not know (we have all had this) the number? Quickly punch in the area code (or the entire number) and hit enter! Don't know anybody from that area, then why waste my cell phone minuets talking to them just say "sorry dude, I don't have the bandwidth for you right now" and let them roll to voice mail

You can also punch in a address and get a map to come up or a the close location. Print it off and help maintain our position as "Man of the House" and NOT have to ask for directions. Besides, just like I tell my wife, Columbus did not ask for directions and I'm not about to start now! Ha-Ha...

Simple stuff like maybe you are at a friends house and want to check our forum but forgot the web address? Just punch in "Triumph Boat Owners" for example AND if you use quotes the search results will only return such... Maybe you need to find the web site for some product? Most anything has a .COM on the Web now days so first try WWW.X.COM (X being the product name) and if you hit nothing, then punch the product name it into the Google Tool Bar and hit enter...

Harder stuff like PC error messages, copy the exact error message and punch it into the Tool Bar also... Odds are you will find some site that explains the error and how to fix it

You can also ask a question in the tool bar such as "How do I change a tire" (great one for the ladies) and that is a case where I would leave the quotes off the question to get the most returns

Really the list is endless and the more you use it, the more you will see that sometimes you have too many words and need to back off some like instead of "2005 Mercury Optimax Blown Power Heads" try using just "Optimax Blown Power Heads" it is up to you though to dig though the sites and really weight IF the information is of value to you or not....

Hard to find stuff... Well that is a different animal and requires a different tool which is Copernic http://www.copernic.com/en/products/agent/index.html
Copernic takes a little time to set up but it hammers (mine is set for 18) different search engines all at the same time, dump the duplicate site listings, and highlight in yellow my search topic. Just another great "Free" search tool for really digging deep into the Net World Wide to find something... Just remember to use the "Exact Phrase" setting first, or you will spend hours digging (save that for later when you get zero returns) though sites for nothing...

What if the site is in China for example? No biggie, just convert the page to English and see if it has the information you are looking to get Just punch the web page address here http://babelfish.altavista.com/ and have it convert it for you OR you could copy the and paste the text and read it in the language of choice. Matter of fact, I many times answer world wide support E-mails for my company by converting the inbound E-mail note to English, try and get the "Rough Idea" of what that person is asking, type my reply back in English and have babel fish translate it to the language of choice... It's not exact, but close enough for most of the meanings to make it back and forth

One last site is for conversions, kids in school really love this site for science homework and it has come in really handy for me more than once http://www.onlineconversion.com/

So enjoy! and before burning fuel to go dig though your local library, you might want to try these tools first....

Dave

[LittleCasino]

"You da man Dave!"

[fridaysoff]

"DITTO" Dave;
John D.

[Putershark]

Guys,
You are more than welcome and glad to be of service

Couple of things I forget is how to get the Google Toolbar and it is located at the bottom right (along with some other free toys like Google Earth) on this page here http://www.google.com/intl/en/options/

Also yesterday as my wife was driving back from Atlanta she called me and wanted to know "how far" she was from Tampa? I asked the the city name from the last exit she just passed (also so I knew how long I had to clean up the house ) and then just typed in...

Leesburg Florida to Tampa Florida

into the toolbar (without quotes) and hit enter and got a map with distance, rough ETA time, and miles so she could plan her next fuel stop... Great Tool and really only limited by how you "request / ask" for information and as the years go by, the algorithms are becoming more and more "human like" in nature when returning information (data) back to us...

Dave

[Genelie]

Putershark, that is great info for non computor people like me. How about you come out for a visit, and set up my pc Kidding. But thanks for the info.

[NCangler]

Thanks for this great information Dave. You rock!

[Putershark]

Originally Posted by Genelie

Putershark, that is great info for non computor people like me. How about you come out for a visit, and set up my pc Kidding. But thanks for the info.

Would love too, but that is one very long drive for sure... First off though, I would make sure you run though this tweek guide for I.E. How to tweak your Internet Explorer 5.0 and then let me know which OS you are running (98, W2K, WINXP) and I "might" have a speed guide written that I can E-mail to you, that will make it run a faster and more stable. Next best thing to being there and driving your mouse myself

Dave