Windows 10
Ten things you should do withyour PC
March 2020 | |^15
A
D
Exercise your brain
Catalogue your collections
*HWULGRIWKHPLQGIRJE\JLYLQJ\RXUPLQGDUHJXODU
ZRUNRXWZLWKWKHKHOSRIWKHVHI UHHJDPHV
6WD\RQWRSRI\RXUYDULRXVOLEUDULHVE\UHFRUGLQJ
WKHPDOOXVLQJWKHEULOOLDQW'DWD&URZ
s we get older, it’s
important to stay active
both mentally and
physically. Exercising
your brain has all kinds
of benefits, but it pays to
vary the types of exercise you do to
keep things stimulated and open new
neural pathways. Your PC can play a
huge role in this – all you need to do is
target the right kind of games and
puzzles, and the good news is they
don’t have to cost a penny.
First, brush up on your word skills. Fan
of crosswords? If you’re happy to do so
online, head to http://www.boatloadpuzzles.
com/playcrossword where you’ll find
over 40,000 simple and cryptic puzzles
available to solve in your web browser.
Perhaps you prefer word searches, in
which case LR Studios’ Word Search
– Puzzles app is free on the Microsoft
Store and offers unlimited puzzles. Next,
give your maths skills a boost withMicrosoft Sudoku, one of
the few MS games to be
completely free through
the Microsoft Store, no
strings attached. How
about improving your
language skills? Duolingo
(www.duolingo.com) will
teach you just about any
foreign language and will
help you to stay on top of
your learning to ensure
the vocabulary sinks into
your memory.
BigJig (www.lenagames.
com/bigjig.htm) will keep
you occupied for hours with
a wide range of jigsaw puzzles and
no intrusive ads (a paid-for version
allows you to generate puzzles from
your own images once you’ve
completed those offered within the
program), while Brain Workshop
(http://brainworkshop.sourceforge.net/)claims to boost cognitive function
using the controversial N-Back
mental exercise.
Finally, if you want to really give your
brain a workout, visit Braingle (www.
braingle.com) where you can select
Mentalrobics to exercise your brain on
a daily basis with a range of puzzles.ata Crow (www.
datacrow.net) makes it
possible to create and
maintain a catalogue of
important items. Built-in
modules cover books,
contacts, audio CDs, movies (including
TV), but you can build your own custom
modules too.
Once installed, select your collection
type using the icons beneath the menu
bar. From here choose ‘File > Item
Wizard’ to enter the first item in your
collection. You’ll see that Data Crow
links into several online databases- sadly, at time of writing, both IMDB
and Amazon don’t work, but thankfully
other online databases offered by the
program do.
Select your database, type in your title
and with a bit of luck you’ll find the
exact item you own (multiple editions
may exist, forcing you to review each
one manually). You can then add this- complete with
thumbnail image of the
cover – without having to
enter any additional
information. All
information is editable, so
once entered, simply
double-click an item to
view and – if necessary –
make changes or add
additional elements such
as photos.
- complete with
Your collection
As your collection grows,
Data Crow allows you to
organise your collection into groups,
which you define by selecting which
fields to use. You can also apply filters
and perform a quick keyword search
of your collection to help find what
you’re looking for.
Many people like to lend items from
their collection to others, and Data Crowprovides a Loan Administration tab
to allow you to manage this process
by recording when an item was lent
out and to whom. You’ll never need
to wonder what happened to that
book or CD you may or may not
have lent out (if only you could
remember) again.Microsoft Sudoku is a great way to clear the mental cobwebs and
boost your learning power.Another benefit of Data Crow is that it’ll stop you buying duplicates
of items you already own.