Here's a hard fact of life: Computers crash. Although they don't crash that often, it happens. Or your computer could become infected by a virus that trashes your files ( especially on Windows). Besides computer problems, there are plenty of other things that can go wrong, including fires, mudslides, earthquakes, hurricaneswell, you get the idea. That's why you need to be thinking right now about backing up your data files.
A backup is a recent copy (or better yet, multiple copies) of your documents. If your computer has a CD-RW drive, you can burn backup copies onto rewritable CDs. Another good solution is to buy an external hard drive, hooking it up via FireWire or USB2.
No matter how you backup, you should get into the habit of backing up regularly. Establish a schedule. Get into the habit of backing up your files before you shut down your computer, for example. If you never shut your computer down, do your backup first thing in the morning when you're fresh; doing backups at the end of the day when you want to get away from the computer doesn't work as well. Having multiple backup copies is the extra safe way to go. Keep one of your backups off the premises in a safe place, such as a safe deposit box. Bring in that backup and update it periodicallyonce a month, for example. Then take the backup off-site again. Having multiple backups does you no good if all of your backup disks are destroyed along with your computer.
Explore Toolbars p. 12
On the Mac, you can use the Configure Toolbar dialog to add custom buttons to the toolbars for your accounts, which makes it easier to open the individual accounts, instead of opening the Account List, then double-clicking the account name .