May 20, 2007

Welcome to Issue #268 of the Internet Legal Research Weekly, a newsletter that delivers relevant and timely legal research information, and other fun stuff, to your inbox every Sunday. If you like what you read, please forward this newsletter to anyone you think might be interested, and encourage him or her to do the same! To subscribe, all you have to do is visit Inter Alia and fill out the subscription form -- it's free!

Blawgs of the Week
Here are some of the great law-related weblogs I featured this past week on Inter Alia:

We're still discussing the top 8-10 things that can cause your computer to run slowly. Next up: Runaway Processes!

Sometimes a program or other process on your computer will just get out of control, and take over all of your computer's processing power. On my computer, I can tell when this is happening when I begin to hear the computer's fan go into overdrive. Here's how to detect and stop a runaway process.

To find out which process is causing your slowdown, press CTRL+ALT+DEL to bring up the Windows Task Manager. Click the Processes tab, to get a listing of the processes currently running on your computer. The CPU column will tell you the percentage of processing cycles taken up by that process. To find out what's using the most, click on CPU twice -- this will sort your list in order of what's being used the most. If you have a program that's taking up 95-99% of the CPU, you need to terminate that process (if it's the System Idle Process that's taking up most of it, don't worry about that one -- it's supposed to take up a lot when your computer processes are not in heavy use).

To stop a runway process, highlight it and either 1) click End Process near the bottom of the window, or 2) right-click on the process, select End Process. Either way, you'll be asked to confirm that you want to end the process -- say Yes.

If this doesn't work, try a reboot -- that will usually free up that runaway process.

Next week: Disk fragmentation.

Do you have a question about searching the Internet or your computer in general? Drop me an e-mail at tom(at)inter-alia(dot)net – I’ll post your question (don’t worry, I won’t use your real name) and try to get an answer for you!

U.S. Geological Survey
Here's another government agency worth bookmarking. The mission of the USGS is to provide scientific information on biology, geography, geology, water, and more. The best resources can be found under the Maps, Products & Publications and Education tabs. Under the first, you have access to over 300,000 book, map, and serial records, order USGS products, search the publications warehouse, and use the various databases available -- geologic information, national water data, the National Map, and geospatial information. The Education tab opens you up to lots of information for school-age children, and adults as well. Even better, you can subscribe to a number of RSS feeds, to receive notice about earthquakes, landslides, avian flu, volcanoes, and the latest news updates.

StateList
If you need access to state print publications, this is the list for you. This page is maintained at the University of Illinois law library, and it is simply a listing of links to state publication checklists that are currently available on the Internet. That's it -- nothing more to this page.

National Criminal Justice Association
The NCJA represents state, tribal, and local governments on crime prevention and crime control issues. This site is really devoted primarily to Association members, but the researcher can find useful information there, too. Under Policies and Practices and Government Affairs you'll find policy statements, congressional scorecards on criminal justice, information on the role of the federal government in the administration of justice, issue papers, congressional committee rosters, and more.

State Privacy Laws Regarding Library Records
Another simple, straightforward page, this one from the American Library Association. And when I say simple, I mean *simple* -- here you'll find links to privacy statutes on library records, but all the links take you to RTF document files that you can print or download to your computer. Again, nothing more to this site -- but exactly what you need.

LungCancer.org
This site is sponsored by CancerCare, and serves as a source of information for lung cancer patients and their families, and to provide referrals to free professional counseling, education programs, and financial assistance for people with lung cancer. There are areas for Patients and CareGivers, Health Care Professionals, and the Media -- each area has different resources. The area for patients and caregivers provides basic information on lung cancer, information on clinical trials, support groups, and telephone workshops, as well as a link on women and cancer.

If you saw Spiderman 3, you might enjoy Double Wires -- you've got to keep the player alive by swinging by wires from place to place.

byokal is not so much a game as a toy. You can create your own kaleidoscope by clicking dragging shapes and patterns.

Well, that’s it for Issue #268 – I hope you liked it! If you did, pass this along to anyone you think might be interested, and encourage him or her to subscribe. Also, feel free to drop me an e-mail any time if you have questions, or if you have websites or other topics you want included in a future issue.

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