Computer Active (UK)

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- Garry East Michael Gill Fraser Drummond

Why can’t I make photo slideshows in Windows?

Why can’t I make photo slideshows in Windows?

QI’m a new subscriber, with my first issue being 597. I was interested in the ‘Use Windows’ hidden tool to make photo slideshows’ Workshop. I followed the instructio­ns, but when I select my photos and rightclick, I don’t see the ‘Create a new video’ option. Any ideas?

AThis is because your computer doesn’t have the Windows 10 Photos app set as the default photo viewer. This could be your choice or a setting that has been changed by an image-related tool that you’ve installed.

There are two solutions. The first is to revert to having the Photos app as the default viewer, which will put the ‘Create a new video’ option back on the rightclick menu. Alternativ­ely, you can manually launch the Windows 10 Video Editor and then drag and drop photos to the Storyboard area.

To achieve the former, first click Start followed by the Settings cog and then Apps. Next, on the left, click ‘Default apps’ and then, on the right, note what app is listed under the ‘Photo viewer’ heading. If you want to keep it as the default, just skip to the next paragraph. Otherwise, click the listed app and then, from the ‘Choose an applicatio­n’ pop-up menu, click to select Photos (see screenshot below).

If you’d prefer to keep the existing app as your default photo viewer, then launch Video Editor manually in one of two ways. Either click the Start menu and then just scroll through the list of apps to find and then click ‘Video editor’, or click Start then type video editor and then click ‘Video editor’.

How do I close Gammy?

QFollowing your suggestion, I downloaded Gammy ( https:// getgammy.com) and now have a problem. On my PC it can be found as an app by searching for it, showing up as gammy.exe. However, it will not open to enable me to adjust the settings.

Equally, I cannot delete it because it is running in the background. This is annoying when I want to work on photograph­s because I am not sure of the correct brightness levels. I have contacted the developer who responded quickly, but the problem remains. Is there a simple way to close a program running in the background?

AWhen Gammy is running its icon will appear in the notificati­on area, at the far right-hand side of the taskbar. To show Gammy’s controls, just right-click it and, from the pop-up menu, choose Show Gammy. On this menu you’ll also see a ‘Run at startup’ box (see screenshot above right): click to clear the tick from this to stop Gammy launching automatica­lly with Windows or click Quit to close it immediatel­y.

Othewise, yes, you can force Gammy (or any other program) to close. It’s not normally advised as it can lead to data loss, but as Gammy doesn’t store personal data there is no real risk. To do this, you’ll need to launch Task Manager. Either right-click a blank area of the taskbar and choose Task Manager, or use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+shift+esc. Then, in the Processes tab, locate and right-click the Gammy entry before choosing ‘End task’.

Was your Facebook email advice wrong?

QIn Issue 597’s Problems Solved you answered Roger Lewry’s question about whether his wife’s Facebook email had been hacked. Roger says his wife wanted to change her Facebook email address, so created a new one in order to delete the original. So far, so good. However, he goes on to say that they received a message saying the new email address is associated with another account. You then reply that “something is clearly awry if Facebook is telling you that your wife’s email address is already in use”. But it isn’t! It is her new email address that’s already in use, not her old one. What am I missing here? Any newly created email address may well be in use already, hence the more esoteric email addresses people use to make them unique.

AOur assumption was that Roger and his wife merely inputted an alternativ­e (but existing) email address of hers. So, the email would have been new to Facebook but not new to Roger’s wife. We believe this to be a fair assumption, and the correct one.

This alternativ­e (existing) email address being in use by another Facebook user could be cause for concern. Later in our reply we used the phrase ‘alternativ­e email address’. On reflection our reply would’ve been clearer if we’d used this phrase to begin with, so apologies for any confusion.

 ??  ?? Select Photos under the ‘Choose an applicatio­n’ pop-up menu
Select Photos under the ‘Choose an applicatio­n’ pop-up menu
 ??  ?? On the Gammy menu, you can adjust the controls and select ‘Run at startup’
On the Gammy menu, you can adjust the controls and select ‘Run at startup’

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