Installing Google Picasa 3.9

Google Picasa is free, versatile software for oragnising and improving your photos. But it has a two potential traps when you install it.

Here are the solutions.

To download and install Picasa, go to http://picasa.google.com/

When installing, I’d suggest that you DON’T tick the option to use Picasa’s picture viewer, as it changes the way your computer behaves with photos.

When you first run Picasa, it will pop up the following screen:

It’s asking you where it’s allowed to look for pictures to show in Picasa. Don’t worry – it won’t move or copy anything; it’s just finding out where your pictures live.

I suggest that you pick “Only search My Documents, My Pictures and the Desktop” – otherwise Picasa will transform into a bloodhound and sniff out every logo and image stored anywhere on your computer… and show them all mixed-up with your family pictures.

If you want to include photos from other folders, once Picasa is up and running for you, go to the Tools menu, select Folder Manager, select the folders that you want Picasa to include and mark them with the blue circular arrows.

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