Terry's Computer Tips - Newsletter
January 21, 2007

Volume 2, Number 32 — Sunday, January 21, 2007

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

Protect Your Computer — Block Spyware and Adware
Get CounterSpy from Sunbelt Software
That's what I use! Read my review

7. Print Problems from Web Browser

Subscriber T Niver wrote me several weeks ago about some problems he was having:

I switched from AOL to PeoplePC and ever since I cannot print from the Internet without getting all this extra text and what I wanted to print is embedded somewhere in the extra text.

Here is a sample of the first few lines of what I get when I print:

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W#C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML xmlns=<http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml>http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml
-IE-DisplayURL="mhtml:mid//00000000/">
<HEAD><META content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" http-equiv=Content-Type> <BASE HREF="mhtml:mid://00000000/">

I also get this same text when I view a help file in Internet explorer.

Please help. Thank you.

I couldn't give him an exact answer, but I could suggest some ways to solve it. In person, I could probably experiment and solve it, but I can't do that by phone or email.

I suspect his problem came, not from starting to use PeoplePC, but from stopping using AOL as his default Internet Service Provider. AOL has had a long history of installing and taking over communications programs — and not completely fixing everything when it uninstalled.

The web browser (I assume he is using IE) is actually printing the HTML source code and not the page after formatting to be displayed.

Often a messed-up IE is strictly an IE issue. Using a different browser will probably work.

If you're using WinXP and IE6, install IE7. That resets a lot of IE's web browser settings.

If you're having problems and recently uninstalled IE7, you can reset all the Internet Explorer settings via IE's Internet Options 'Advanced' tab.

(click on the image for a larger version)

This dialog box is also available via the Internet Options selection in the Windows XP Control Panel.

I suggested that he download Firefox and try printing with it. I use Firefox for all my web surfing -- and use Internet Explorer only at Microsoft.com and at sites (1) that I trust and (2) will only work with Internet Explorer.

You can read more about Firefox on my Firefox pages.

Finally, if you can't solve the problem any other way, either get one of your computer guru friends to solve it for you (many do this as a sideline job) or take it to your local computer shop for assistance.

GoToWebinar 30 Day Free Trial
Web Seminars for up to 1000 People
terryscomputertips.com/Webinar

CounterSpy v2 - Free Trial
Free Trial - 15-day Full-function trial
terryscomputertips.com/CounterSpy

Discover Tips And Tricks about Microsoft Office
so YOU can use it like a Pro!
terryscomputertips.com/OfficeTips

Ads by Terry

Comment About This Article Now

8. Recommend my Terry's Computer Tips Newsletter to Your Friends

If you like my Terry's Computer Tips email newsletter or the online edition, you can help me increase the number of subscribers to my free emailed newsletter.

Tell a friend!

Not only do you get notices that the newsletters are available and content that is not in the online newsletter, but subscribing is the only way to get my Special Edition Newsletters which go only to subscribers.

If you get my free Terry's Computer Tips email newsletter, please feel free to forward your copy of the newsletter to a friend or friends that you think would be interested. Be sure to forward the entire newsletter, including my copyright notices and any advertising.

Of course, if you do not get my free email newsletter, I invite you to subscribe, too!