An Email Experience in the Czech
Republic or "Click on the Cz"
Bill Stupka June 15, 2001 During
a recent trip to the Czech Republic I decided to send a few email notes to my family in
the U.S. There was really no important reason to do it. I just thought that it would be
fun for them and me. The opportunity presented itself in Brno, at the Hotel Voronez. The
hotel had a Windows PC computer with internet access available for guests for a few crowns
per hour. So, I sat down at the keyboard and started to work. Before I get into this, a
few points about accessing your email account away from home. Just in case that you don't
know...it is impractical to access your U.S based email account using the usual local U.S.
telephone number for your Internet Service Provider (ISP) from a foreign country such as
the Czech Republic. It would be a really expensive long distance call. Unless you find an
"Internet Cafe" that happens to have an account with your internet provider you
need to have some form of "Webmail". Webmail is email that is accessed through a
web address, which means that it is available on any computer that has access to the
internet, anywhere in the world. Many internet providers, such as AOL and Earthlink,
include such a service with normal accounts. There are also email services, such as Hot
Mail, that are purely web mail and can also be accessed anywhere in the world. If you
intend to use your email account in Europe or any foreign country check your internet
service provider for webmail service before you leave. Ok, back to Brno. The first thing
to do was to enter my webmail address into the hotel computer. Immediately, there was
trouble when I could not not type characters used in web addresses, such as //, : or even
the @. I soon realized that the keyboard was setup for Czech, which, of course, it should
be. Looking at the lower left of the screen the "Cz" indicated the computer was,
in fact, in the Czech mode. See below.
In fact, the keyboard was in the Czech
QWERTZ mode which, compared to the usual U.S. QWERTY keyboard, has the "Y" and
the "Z" reversed, and other keys are affected as well. The fact that the Cz was
visible on bar in the lower right of the screen also confirmed that there was more than
one language installed on the computer OK, switching to the computer to English should be
no problem. Normally, to switch a U.S. windows computer with Multilanguage Support to
another language you type a two key combination; such as Ctrl-Shift or Alt-Shift. I did
that and nothing happened! I tried both combinations. Still, nothing happened. Well, I
fumbled around for a little while, and finally a member of our tour walked up. "How
you doing?" "Not too good. This thing won't switch from Czech to
English..etc,etc." "Here, try clicking on the Cz, in the lower right." I
did that and a little menu popped up allowing me to select either Czech or English. I
selected English (En), and life was, once again, good. All the keys were back where they
should be. Email began to flow.
I have worked with computers for a long
time, and thought that I was pretty familiar with Windows Multilanguage Support (the
Windows function that switches languages, and puts the Cz or En in the lower left), but I
did not know that you could click once on the En or Cz and get a menu to select the other
language(s). I should have known since all of the other icons in the lower right function
in a similar way, and I knew that. Brain lock! Fortunately my friend happened along to
help me out of the problem. So, I thought that I would pass this tidbit of information on
so that you would not be tripped up too. Remember, when in the Czech Republic click on the
"Cz." I Hope that this is helpful to you. By the way, the helpful person that
got me out of my email glitch was your past president, Joe Hartzel.
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