In the past, computer users put their mouse on the right side of the keyboard. Computers required that because of the two buttons on the mouse. Think about it. Left click and right click are necessary tools for many features on a device. However, Windows 8 lets you switch from a right to a left handed mouse. This is a great benefit to people with carpal tunnel or just someone who would be more comfortable using a left handed mouse.

To switch from a right to a left handed mouse, go to the Start screen and start to type Control Panel. Click on the Control Panel in the apps list.

Next, click Hardware and Sound in the Control Panel, then Devices and Printers. If you don't see this option, click Devices and Printers.

Click on the mouse link. If you don't see the link, right click on your mouse and select Mouse Settings from the Context Menu.

Check the box that says, "Switch Primary and Secondary Buttons." Click Apply, then OK. If there's not an Apply button, just click OK.

When you do this, your buttons are switched. The current left click button is now right click and vice versa.

Are you a slow double clicker? Some people have no problem double clicking quickly to perform an action. Others, on the other hand, may be slower at it. For this reason, you can adjust the double click speed. You can also change how the mouse indicator moves across the screen to make it easier to follow its path. Basically, these features make it less difficult to complete tasks and know where your mouse is on the screen.

To do these things, go back to the Control Panel. Once again, you're going to go to Devices and Printers. Click the Mouse link. If you don't see a Mouse link, right click on your mouse, and select Mouse Settings.

To change the double-click speed, go to the Double-Click Speed under the Buttons tab. You can either make it slower, so you can take longer to double click. Or faster. Just drag the slider.

Now, to adjust the pointer motion setting for your mouse, click the Pointer Options tab.

Go to the Motion section.

Now you can adjust how fast the pointer moves across your screen. You can make it slower or faster by dragging the slider.

The Snap To option makes selecting options in dialogue boxes easier because you can make your mouse pointer move to the default selection - or the selection that most people choose. You can also make it to where your mouse pointer leaves a trail across your screen as you move it. This makes it easier to see where your mouse is.

To do both of these things, we're going to return to the Pointer Options tab shown above.

If you want your mouse to "snap to" the default option in dialogue boxes, check the box in the Snap To section.

If you want your mouse pointer to have a tail, check the box that says "Display Pointer Trails." Next, use the slider to tell Windows how long you want that tail to be.

You can also set two other options for pointer tails:

You can hide the pointer while typing, or you can have it so Windows shows you the location of the pointer when you press the CTRL key. Click Apply, then OK.

You can adjust the settings for the touch keyboard to make it easier to use. You can change the language for your keyboard and how touch gestures are interpreted by the keyboard when you type on it. Plus, much more. However, if you don't have touch capabilities for a touch keyboard, you will not see these settings; therefore, you won't be able to adjust them.

To adjust the touch keyboard settings, click the Windows key + I. This takes you to the Settings panel.

Click Change PC Settings. You should be familiar with this by now.

Now, click General on the left.

You can turn off/on any of the settings by adjusting the sliders.

You can also customize visual settings to make it easier to see things on your screen. You can adjust the screen contrast and also make the items displayed on your screen smaller or bigger. Just remember how contrast works. If you turn your screen to high contrast, the background will be black and the text will be white.

To adjust these settings, click the Window key + I, then Change PC settings again.

Click Ease of Access on the left.

If you want high contrast, click the slider from Off (default) to On.

If you want to make everything on your screen bigger, click the slider under "Make Everything On Your Screen Bigger" from Off to On.

Caret browsing sounds fancy and complicated, but it's really not. It simply means using your keyboard to navigate through a webpage - instead of your mouse. When you use caret browsing, you use End, Home, Page up, Page Down, right and left keys instead of a mouse to move within a webpage from link to link - and to select text.

To turn on caret browsing, press the Windows key + I again. Click Change PC Settings, then go back to Ease of Access on the left.

Click the slider under "Tab through webpages and apps using caret browsing" to turn it from Off (default) to On.

Speech recognition is not new to Windows 8. It's been around for more than a few years and contained in other versions of Windows. However, the technology has gotten better and better, and Windows has improved its ability to recognize voices and accents so it gives more accurate results. You can use Speech Recognition instead of using your keyboard. You might have to clean the results up a little bit when you're finished, but typically it's just punctuation that needs editing.

To turn on speech recognition, go to the Start screen and start typing Control Panel. Click on the Control Panel in the apps list.

Now, there are two different things you might see in your Control Panel, which means there are two different ways to start Speech Recognition. We're going to cover both.

Method #1

Click Ease of Access in the Control Panel.

Method #2

Click Voice Recognition in the Control Panel.

Click Start Speech Recognition.

Click Next to leave the Welcome Screen.

The Speech Recognition Wizard will help you set up speech recognition. However, you must have an audio input device - or a microphone - for the wizard to launch.

To set up speech recognition, click the type of input you want to use - or select your microphone.

Click Next.

Now, the wizard will set up recognition based on your voice. Read the sentences that are shown.

Click Next.

Click Next again.

Click Finish.

Now that you have speech recognition set up, you can try it out and use it.

Go back to the Control Panel and to Speech Recognition.

Simply click the microphone on the Speech Recognition Controls.

You can speak a command to your computer, such as "Open Word Pad."

Now, speak a sentence.

The firewall is a feature that monitors everything that's sent to your computer from the Internet or your network. It then either allows access if what's being sent is safe -- or it denies it if the firewall believes it could compromise your personal information or if it believes the information to be a virus or other form of malware. You can turn on Windows Firewall to help protect you. However, don't think a firewall is all the protection you need. You'll still need an anti-virus and anti-spyware program.

To turn on Windows Firewall:

Go to the Start screen and start typing Control Panel.

Open the Control Panel.

Go to Systems and Security, then click Windows Firewall. (If you don't see Systems and Security listed, click Windows Firewall from the Control Panel instead).

From here, you can turn Windows Firewall on or off by clicking the link of the left hand side.

You can customize your settings for private networks and public networks (such as when you connect to Wi-Fi at a restaurant).

Click OK.

The privacy settings in Windows 8 can be adjusted so that certain programs can access your location, name, or account picture. The Maps app, for example, needs your location to work properly. If you don't give that app permission to access your location, then the app isn't going to be as useful.

To allow access to your location, click the Windows key + C to view the charms.

Click the Settings charm, then click the Change PC Settings link.

Click Privacy on the left hand side of the screen.

Click to turn "on" the feature "let apps use my location."

If you want apps to be able to use your name and picture, click on "Let apps use my name and account picture."

Even though it's a good idea to install your own anti-virus and anti-spyware programs, Windows 8 provides protection too with Windows Defender. Windows Defender is integrated with Internet Explorer. It scans files you download and detects threats. In addition, you can run scans whenever you want.

To set up Windows Defender, go to the Start screen and start to type Windows Defender.

Click Windows Defender in the search results to open it.

Make sure it's turned on. If it's on, you'll see a green checkmark beside "Real-time protection."

To scan for malware, go to Windows Defender. Under the Home tab (open by default), select either a quick, full, or custom scan. If you choose a custom scan, you can tell Windows Defender what areas of your computer you want scanned.

Next, click the Scan Now button.

When you installed Windows 8 or first booted up your device, you created your account. Your account is what you use to log in to Windows.

If more than one person uses your computer, you may want to create separate accounts for each user.

To create a new user, click the Windows key + C to access the charms. Click the Settings charm.

Next, click Change PC Settings.

Click Users on the left hand side, then click Add a User.

If you want the new user to log in with a Windows Live account, enter their email address associated with the account in the Email Address field, then click Next.

Note: If you want to create a local account for them instead, click the "Sign in without a Microsoft Account Link." If you want to sign up for a new email address and create a Microsoft Live account for the user, click the link that says "Sign up for a new email address."

The snapshot above lets you know that you've successfully added the user.

Click Finish.

The user will now log in with their Microsoft Live ID and password.

To change your login password, click on the Settings charm again, then go to the Change PC settings link.

Click on Users on the left hand side, then the Change Your Password button.

You'll see the screen below.

Enter your old (current) password, then enter the new password. Reenter it again to make sure you typed it in correctly.

Click Next.

Click Finish.

A password picture is available to those with touchscreen capabilities. With a password picture, you choose a picture, then record three onscreen gestures that are associated with the picture. These gestures are what you'll use to sign on. For example, maybe you make a "Z" with your fingers.

To create a password picture, click Users on the left of the PC Settings screen (as shown in the last section).

The first thing you'll be asked to do is confirm your user password:

Click OK.

Next, you'll be asked to choose a picture:

Click Choose Picture.

Select a picture from a library and click Open.

If this is the picture you want to use, click Use This Picture.

Once you click Use This Picture, it's time to set up your password gestures.

To set up the password gestures, add three gestures to your picture by swiping your finger across it in any position or direction.

On the next screen, you'll be asked to repeat the gestures.

Click Finish.

Entering your password and email address when you login can be a lot of typing. For that reason, Windows 8 allows you to create a password pin. A password pin consists of four characters. It makes logging on quick and easy.

Here's how to create a password pin.

Go back to PC Settings and click Users on the left.

Click the Create PIN button.

Enter your password.

Click OK.

Enter your 4 digit code, then type it again to confirm it. Click Finish.

If you ever want to change your pin or remove it, come back to this screen and click either the Change Pin or Remove button.

Family Safety in Windows 8 gives you a way to protect and restrict your children when they're online under their own user accounts. You can choose different settings for each child/user and pick the settings that are appropriate.

Let's take a look at Family Safety to show you what all you can do.

We'll start by teaching you how to turn it on.

Go to the Start screen and start typing Control Panel. Click on the Control Panel to open it.

Click Set Up Family Safety For Any User - or Family Safety.

Select the user that you want to apply Family Safety settings to.

• Under Family Safety, click the ON button.

  Set Web Restrictions

  Web restrictions allow you to control what websites a user can access.

• To set web restrictions, go back to Family Safety.

  In Windows Settings, click Web Filtering. (Circled below in red.)

  Next, choose if you want to control what websites the user can view. Click the option that allows you give/deny access to websites to restrict what sites the user can visit.

  Then click the "Choose Web Filtering Level" link.

  Choose the web restriction level that works best for you and the user.

  If you choose "Allow list only," click the link that says "Click here to change allow list" to add the websites you allow.

  Set Time Limits

  Time limits allow you to control how long a user is on the Internet. To turn on time limits, go to Family Safety.

  Click the Time Limits link, as shown in the snapshot above.

  You can set the number of hours the user can use the PC per day - and set the time of day a user can use the PC. Just click on the appropriate link.

  Let's set a time allowance to show you how it works.

  In the snapshot below, we've chosen to set the amount of time the user can use the PC.

  Enter the time for weekdays and weekends.

  Set Up Games

  You can also restrict games by going to Family Safety. Click the "Windows Store and Game Restrictions" in Family Safety, as shown below.

  Check the box that says the user can only use games and Windows Store apps that are allowed.

  Next, click Set Game and Windows Store Ratings to set a maximum rating for the games the user is allowed to download and/or play.

  Click the Allow or Block Specific Games link to allow or block specific games. For example, there may be a game that's rated Adult and you have the user blocked from playing Adult games, but you want to let the user play that one game. Click this link to do that.