Neat Things You Can Do On the Internet Updated

For the folks that were in our Internet class yesterday at the Socastee Library, you will remember that the slide presentation had lots of broken links in it.  My apologies, but they are now fixed.  You can either click on the link in my original post or for convenience, I'll post it again here:

http://www.slideshare.net/JimWhite/neat-useful-things-to-do-on-the-internet

Again, sorry for the inconvenience.

I would appreciate it if you would leave a comment to let me know you have been here.  You can do so be clicking on the word "Comments" to the right of my name at the very bottom of this post.  You could also ask me questions there about the class or the slides or anything on the slides and I will try to answer you in a following comment.

Neat Things You Can Do On the Internet

On 3/22/2012 Shirley and I will be teaching a new class at the Socastee Library in Horry County SC.  The title of the class is "Neat Things You Can Do On the Internet".  I have uploaded the PowerPoint presentation for the class to Slideshare.  You can find it at

http://www.slideshare.net/JimWhite/neat-useful-things-to-do-on-the-internet

Many folks in our (ahem...) somewhat older generation wonder how we can spend as much time online as we do.  In a two hour trek driving back from Charleston a few weeks ago we began brainstorming a list of all the activities we engage in online and I "wrote" them down on my iPhone as Shirley was driving.  We were amazed at the size and scope of the list and decided to turn it into a class that would answer the question and give folks the opportunity to learn how we do what we do.  I created the PowerPoint presentation to use in the class and included many many hyperlinks that will take you to the sites we use.  95% of them are sites we have directly used ourselves, the other 5% are related to the same topics.

Following is a list of all the topics,  Most have multiple sub topics in the slideshow where all have multiple hyperlinks.

Category/Slide Title

Reference Sites

Find Entertainment/Buy Tickets

Real Estate Research

Health Research

Household Hints Decorating Ideas Appliance Repair

Read Magazines & Newspapers

Download and Read Books for Free

Horry County Online Services

Shop for New or Used Car

Travel (Air, Rail, Bus, Cruise)

Video - Search for and Play Video Clips on Youtube

Podcasts (Internet Radio) Find and Play or Download

Research Gardening Issues

Education on All Levels

Hunt & Apply For a Job

Shop and Buy Used Items

Shop for New Goods

Find a Church

Communicate (text, voice and video)

Share Pictures With Friends and Relatives

Weather for Anywhere on Demand

Track Packages from UPS, FedEx, USPS

Social Media

Community Involvement

News on Demand

Find Lost $Money$

Apple, I Expected Better

Well, my second HP laptop died in two years. The one before that did the same. So, I decided it was time to exit the windows world (at least partly) and buy my first Mac. I ordered my 27" iMac on Aug 5th, the day after my birthday, because that was the start of South Carolina's three day sales tax holiday. On the 16th of August, via Federal Express, my new machine arrived. I haven't been more excited over new hardware in years. I set up (which amounted to nothing more than unpacking it and plugging it in) and powered it up. Nothing. Oh, not quite nothing. I did get a screen and a half of desperate error messages the first two times I tried and after that I got a white screen with Apples little beach ball spinning round and round forever. Recognizing a critical problem, I called Apple support. This was the only good part of the experience. Although the first tech I spoke to could not diagnose the problem, after 10 minutes or so he passed me on to second level support. This tech had me do a few more diagnostic tricks then told me a critical part of the operating system was damaged or missing. He then instructed me in setting up a download of the entire operating system (OS/X Lion). We both hung up and about 3 and a half hours later the 4GB download was finished and installed and I was up and running.

What I need to point out is THIS MACHINE WAS NEVER BOOTED UP AT THE FACTORY. THEY SHIPPED IT WITHOUT EVEN THIS RUDIMENTARY QUALITY CONTROL CHECK!

OK, so now I was up and running. As a learning exercise in this new (for me) Mac world, I decided to make an iMovie of the picture and video clips I had taken on my iPhone at the 2011 Old Time Fiddlers Convention in Galax Virginia a few days earlier. I then intended to burn a movie DVD and give it to my Cousin, who had also attended the festivities. Working a bit here and a bit there I started to learn my way around the new operating system and iMovie and finally got to where I thought I had a worthwhile movie to share. Soooo..... in iMovie, I clicked on Share, then clicked on iDVD which I understood was the software that would burn my new movie on DVD. iDVD was one of the standard pieces of software included in iLife, a package that came standard on my machine. SUPRISE!! Apple decided, with NO NOTICE to stop distributing iDVD with iLife. It's still in the menu on iPhoto but no longer included in iLife. As far as I'm concerned this is just plain FRAUD. How can they change what is included in a package without changing the name of the package or at least giving some notice. I have called Apple and left a message with the tech who helped me on the first problem and have sent them a complaint through their web comment system. Let's see what happens.

Computer Safety Class + Video Skype Chats May Include Ads

Hi All -
First, for those who were in our computer safety class at the Socastee Library yesterday and for anyone else who might be interested, here is the link I promised you to an online version of my slides:

Computer safety presentation

Second item: As you may already know, Microsoft is in the process of buying Skype. We have used video chat on Skype for a long time to stay in touch with family and friends around the country and the world. According to Bloomberg Business Week (May 16-22, 2011), "plans have been put in place to flank Skype video chats with advertisements". My prediction is that, since Microsoft already owns voice recognition software that works quite well, we can expect that in the future the Skype software running on our computers will listen to our conversations and use what it hears to choose the ads that begin to show on the border of your Skype window. You heard it here first!

Removing Personal Information Before Donating or Gifting Your PC

Several friends have recently told me they want to donate or gift an old PC but want to be sure they have removed personal data before doing so. Most of them realize that if they somehow remove ALL data from their hard drive the machine is totally unusable until someone reinstalls some version of an operating system. Many folks have no idea how to do this and don't remember, years after purchase, where they put the CDs with the operating system on them or if they ever got those CDs when they bought the machine. Here is a typical question on the topic that I just received in an email from a good friend who wants to donate his old machine to a charity:

"Jim,

If I reformat my C drive on my old computer I assume that everything is lost including the operating system. That means someone needs to reload my Windows XP, right?? Is there any freeware.... that allows one to “shred a file” so that it can’t be easily read? Also, if I decide to format, can/should I use the “quick format” option?"

Rather than answer in a one-on-one email I thought I'd share the information in this blog post.

General Source of Info on Tech Topics

There is a techie, Leo Notenboom, who keeps a website and blog called Ask Leo ( http://ask-leo.com/ ) where he takes computer related tech questions and answers them for the layman. I read him and refer many people to him and have never read a bad piece of advice from him. Go to that link and in the search box provided enter the words "erase hard drive give away" (without the quotes). The article I want you to read will be the first one listed. it's title is "How Should I Erase My Hard Drive Before I Give it Away?". Note that the title of the first article does not have the word "comments" after it. This means it was written by Leo, not by one of his readers who left a comment. I trust the articles written by Leo. As for comments by others, you're on your own.

In the article, Leo recommends two approaches, one for the paranoid (drill holes in the hard drive) and one for the not-so-paranoid (reformat the hard drive PROPERLY) and goes on to explain what he means by properly. He then goes on to point out that

1. drilling holes is the ultimate solution but leaves the computer unusable
2. reformatting isn't a great solution for the paranoid individual because at some expense data might still be recoverable

so how does the paranoid individual remove data more effectively than multiple unconditional reformats while not physically destroying the hard drive? One good approach is with a free software tool called "Darik's Boot and Nuke" which you can download at WWW.dban.org/download. Note - this is for the power user, not the novice. You will need to know how to burn the downloaded file to a CD (for help see http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Burn-a-CD-or-DVD-from-an-ISO-file and how to change the boot sequence of your machine so it will try to boot from the CD drive before it tries to boot from the hard drive (for help see http://pcsupport.about.com/od/fixtheproblem/ss/bootorderchange.htm

If you are less paranoid and want to leave your operating system on the disk as is but just want to effectively delete your own personal files, you might just drag and drop them into the trash and then empty the trash but you probably already realize that this just removes the entry for the file from the hard drives file index (the directory) leaving the file itself untouched. To actually destroy the file itself you might consider the free program known as Eraser which you can find at http://eraser.heidi.ie/index.php For example, if all the files you want to erase are in "My Documents" you're in good shape.

I hope this helps. Please leave comments here if you have questions and/or you use any of these suggestions.

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An Effective and Free Tool for Wiping Your Hard Drive

Darik's "Boot and Nuke" is a free

An End to Passwords

It can't come too soon for me! I've been dreaming up / approving / disapproving / cursing at new password schemes since the 1970's when the company I worked for (a property/casualty insurance giant) formed a new department under me called "I/T Staff Services" that included, for the first time, computer security. Until then there were no passwords and our user IDs were our last names. My newly appointed security chief recommended to me that we create user IDs that could indicate what variety of user you were (making it possible to attach your user ID to certain rights and privileges) and that we make passwords mandatory, with standardized composition, and have them expire every six months.

Over the years I've watched password standards get more and more complex. No longer the creator of standards, like most of humanity I am on the receiving end. Each day one or more of my many online accounts informs me that my password has to be longer, more complex, and attached to a series of security questions and actions. All this to create a password that, in a year or so, can be broken by a 12 year old kid using free software on his/her game playing computer.

FINALLY the solution may be in sight! Biometrics, a set of technologies aimed at identifying humans based on their unique physiological and/or behavioral attributes has been long on promise and short on delivery for many years with the exception of expensive military installations and phony television scripts. At last a major player, Apple, may be poised to bring this "ease of use" technology to the masses. Check out the article in Computerworld here.

"Robot Computers" - You May Have One

Robot computers - bots for short - are simply garden variety home or business PCs that have been infected by malicious software that takes them over, on a command from the "bad guys", and directs them to do whatever the bad guys want them to do.   Two activities are most likely: 1. they turn your PC into a spam engine, sending advertisements (frequently in your name) to those in your address book and then to thousands of others.  In case you miss the point, let me give you a clear example:  your friends and neighbors receive eMail from you advertising medications to make the male Penis larger.   2. they use your machine to extort money from online companies.  If a given company does not give in to their demand for money, they attack the company's website with their bot army.  Your computer is one of the soldiers in the bot army.

Many people ask how the malicious software gets on their computer.  Typically a piece of malicious software known as a "Trojan" (from the story of the Trojan Horse) is first.  Trojan software typically gets into your computer because you either invite it in or go to some place that provides it.  Here are some common scenarios:

1.  You get an interesting piece of eMail from a trusted source (whose PC is already infected) that contains a hyperlink.  You click on it and it takes you to a web site that takes advantage of a bug (programming error) in your browser (Internet Explorer for example) that lets it download and run software.  The software it downloads is a Trojan which invites it's owners to download additional software anytime they choose. This is usually referred to as a "drive by" attack since it attacks you when all you were doing was visiting their web site.  Your computer would be less vulnerable (but not impervious) to this kind of attack if you are running Windows Update automatically.  To set this up, click on Start, All Programs, Windows Update.

2. Pop up link:  you are happily surfing the web when suddenly, from an infected web site, a popup window appears saying something like "BEWARE your computer is infected with a virus (actually it is not. yet.). "click here" the window says and we will download antivirus software that will clean it out.  You click and down comes the fake "antivirus" software which is in fact, a Trojan that installs itself and invites its creator to download through it any other software desired.

GUESS WHAT!   a major bad guy, owner of a "bot net" consisting of over 30 MILLION PCs has been busted by the police in Holland.  Here is a link to an article in Computerworld (an Information Technology trade newspaper): http://www.computerworlduk.com/in-depth/security/3246108/dutch-police-may-have-broken-the-law-taking-down-bredolab-botnet/

As you can see from the article, the Netherlands police are attempting to warn the owners of those 30 million PCs that their machines have been infected.  Problem is, many folks will ignore the warning, assuming it is bogus.  IT IS NOT!  Follow this link

http://teamhightechcrime.nationale-recherche.nl/nl_infected.php

to see what the warning looks like. If you have seen this on your compter, YOU ARE INFECTED!  What you are infected with is a Trojan.  Of course, the Trojan just provides an entry for the bad guys into your computer.  You can't know WHAT kind of software they have downloaded through the trojan into your PC.  It could be a spam engine, an extortion soldier, a key logger tracking and reporting everything you type from your keyboard, etc etc.  All the Netherlands police can do is tell you that you are infected with something.  You need to scan your computer or have it scanned by a professional.  Believe the warning, it is real.

US government throwing free speech under the bus - Computerworld Blogs

When I was in college, I and six of my friends were thrown out because the administration caught wind of the fact that we were organizing a demonstration on campus where we would advocate for a number of things including the right to have, on campus, political, religious and social clubs. I know first hand what free speech means and how those in power in any institution would suppress it if they could. Lucky for the seven of us, a good lawyer got us back in within a week. Here are some good current examples of the suppression of free speech in this country. I don't know if we will all be so lucky this time:

US government throwing free speech under the bus - Computerworld Blogs

Information at Your Fingertips - WolframAlpha

Some time ago I (and many others) discovered a new kind of information site on the web, WWW.WolframAlpha.com. The function of this site was difficult to describe. It seemed to fit in the same category as indexed information like Wikipedia but it was much more.

Today I (and no doubt millions of others) received an eMail from the WolframAlpha team announcing the availability on their site of WolframAlpha "Widgets". Widgets, in the world of computer programmers are tiny programs that can either stand on their own or be incorporated easily into existing programs.

After playing with Widgets already existing on WolframAlpha for a while and building two WolframAlpha widgets of my own I finally understand and can explain the function provided by the WolframAlpha website and by it's new Widgets. Any data administrator and most programmers understand the difference between stored data and derived data. Most would imply the difference by calling the "derived" variety "information" rather than data. The implication here is that there is some added value to the information over and above the data actually stored in a database or dictionary or encyclopedia. The value added stems from manipulation of the stored data according to programmed rules and/or relationships implied by the structure of the database itself. In simpler terms, it is data plus intelligence.

Once you have either located a widget you like or have built one yourself, Wolfram makes it easy to "lift" the code and include it in your own blog or website. I created two Widgets:

this one shows you the effect of inflation on the value of the US dollar:
RE TYPE THE YEAR TO ONE OF YOUR CHOICE


while this one allows you to locate (on a map and/or globe) where a particular country, state, city, lake, mountain etc is:


Give them a try and see how they work.

As you can see I included the two widgets right in this blog entry. I had to work a very little bit harder to figure out how to include the widgets in the text of this single entry instead of where my blogger template was set up but it turned out to be as simple as a cut and paste.

In the five or so hours I have been playing with this (on and off) 42 more gadgets have been created, stored and indexed on WolframAlpha by people all over the world. Any of them can be incorporated in a website or blog by anyone else, as I have done here with my own creations. This is Web 2.0 at its creative best!

Netflix Terms of Conditions

I just went to the Netflix site to order a new DVD to watch and discovered a notice that I once again had to review and agree to their terms of conditions. Well, I said, if they have changed at least they are letting me know. I then took a look at them - 14 PAGES of legalese. Incredible! Don't tell me it doesn't make any difference because no one reads them - that is a dangerous habit to get into. Red Box is looking really good to me - just drop in your cash when and only when you want to watch something, make your pick and your done - no need to feel you need a team of lawyers.

Introduction to the Internet Class

Today, Friday Feb 12th 2010, Shirley and I will be teaching the Intro to the Internet class at the Socastee SC public library. Slides for the class can be found by clicking here or entering

http://www.slideshare.net/JimWhite/301-intro-to-internet

into your browser's address window and left clicking.

The slides contain many hyperlinks to other resources, including some excellent Youtube entries on the subject. If you check out the presentation, or if you attend the class, I would appreciate it if you would leave comments, suggestions for improvements, etc by clicking on the word comments directly below this post.

Thanks!
Jim White

Apple's Time Capsule Cooks Itself Dead

Apple has a fantastic, integrated, hands off software/hardware solution for backup. The software is called Time Machine and it is amazingly simple to use with a beautiful user interface. The hardware Apple sells to store the backups on is called Time Capsule. Today I bought my wife a Time Capsule to serve as backup storage for her MacBook. I didn't do quite enough research before buying. I have discovered a web site called http://timecapsuledead.org/ where you will find a database of thousands of users whose Time Capsules have died from overheating after an average of 18 months. Poor design for heat removal seems to be the problem. In a forum located here on Apple's site you will find an incredible history of frustrated users discussing the death of their units. Apple so far has refused to acknowledge the problem.

Here is a link to the product page on Apple's web site where they say "you never have to worry about backing up again" and "Its massive 1TB or 2TB server-grade hard drive". Server grade? I don't think so. I ran a data center that had REAL server grade hardware and this stuff would be laughed out of the room. Come on Apple, acknowledge the problem and FIX IT!

We bought our unit at Best Buy to be shipped directly to our house. I won't even take it out of the packaging - I'm returning it to Best Buy as soon as it arrives.

Online Banking Red Flag

To date, fraudulent online withdrawals from customers bank accounts have almost always been "made good" by the bank. The bank would try to recover the money but, if it could not, the bank would "make the customer whole", writing off the loss as a cost of doing business.

It looks like that might be changing. Read this article, then be sure to follow it up in the news. If the bank wins, you may be in real danger using online banking.

Wikis, Blogs and Podcasts: Part One of Web 2.0 Presentation

Well, the presentation of Part One at the Socastee library had to be canceled due to some glitches in the library computer infrastructure. I/T folks are now hard at work fixing the problem and the class will be rescheduled. In the meantime I will be giving the same presentation at the September 1 meeting of the Cypress River Plantation Computer Users Club, open to residents and property owners and their friends. Part one covers Wikis, Blogs and Podcasts, shows you what they are, how they can be useful, and, in the case of Wikis and Blogs, how to create and maintain your own at no expense. You can find the slides for the presentation here. There are many links on the slides, just run the mouse around on each slide to find them.

Web 2.0 The Art of the Internet Possible

Well, I've been teaching computer related classes at Socastee Library for some time now, all of which have been classes already documented by library staff. Now I have developed one of my own, titled Web 2.0 - The Art of the Internet Possible. I intend to include blogs, podcasts. Wikis, social networks, folksonomies, and Mashups but decided to break it into parts one and two after doing the first three items in that list. I am sure that blogs, podcasts and Wikis will take us beyond the supposed one hour of a class. I will include the other three in a different class and give it later this year. I have already put part on up on Slideshare. You can find it on the web at http://www.slideshare.net/JimWhite/web-20-the-art-of-the-internet-possible-1856299

I did a "Computers 102 - Files and Folders" class yesterday at the library. I thought it went pretty well, got some nice comments. I didn't create a Powerpoint presentation for it because it was more of a hands on class. The Web 2.0 will be more lecture plus watch the presentation, not a lot of hands on. I have included lots of hyperlinks in the presentation to other sites on the web, including a link to a great film clip that beautifully explains wikis. I will be demoing the wiki I created to help our family plan our December drip.

AVG Antivirus Free Download Site

In the class I taught yesterday at the Socastee SC Public Library I mentioned that AVG offers a free version of their excellent antivirus software but didn't have the correct link available where it can be downloaded. I promised to locate that and put it up on my blog, so here it is:

http://free.avg.com/download-avg-anti-virus-free-edition?cmpid=fr_bn_free_670

Click on the hyperlink above and it should take you there. If you are remembering what I taught you, you can confirm, before you click, that you are actually going to that web address by looking at the very bottom left of your browser window as you hover the mouse over top of the link.

After clicking on the link and going to the download page you will see three columns where AVG compares their free software with two of their for pay packages. The choice, obviously, is yours. To download the free antivirus, scroll down to the bottom of the columns and click DOWNLOAD under the "free for private use only" column. After downloading you will either have to choose SAVE and then run what you saved or choose RUN rather than save. This will install software.

Remember, if you have any questions you can use the comments link at the bottom of this blog entry. I try to look at it at least once a day and will answer to the best of my ability. Check back within a day to see my answer.

Online Security

On June 24th 2009 at 6:00 p.m. I will be teaching a class in the Socastee Public Library on Online Security. Here is a link to the presentation:

http://www.slideshare.net/JimWhite/socastee-library-online-security

There are hyperlinks throughout the presentation. Left clicking on them will take you to additional information, the back arrow at the top left of your browser window will bring you back to the presentation.

Sorry for the very basic usage info, I'm trying to make this useful for all users.

Maintaining Your PC

My wife and I volunteer teach some computer classes in the Socastee Public Library near Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Tomorrow, June 16th 2009, I will be teaching "Maintaining Your PC". I have created a Powerpoint presentation to accompany the course and have put the presentation up on the Internet on WWW.Slideshare.Net. You can find the presentation by going to Slideshare's home page at WWW.Slideshare.Net and doing a search using the presentation title OR you can go directly to the presentation by clicking here.

There are many hyperlinks in the presentation. They will take you to various articles or Youtube clips that illustrate points in the presentation. Recently Slideshare has made some changes so that the hyperlinks work even if you are not in full screen mode but if you have trouble, try switching to full screen mode by clicking the word full at the bottom right of the presentation image.

I hope you find the presentation useful. Feel free to use it yourself either from Slideshare or downloading it to your own PC.

Starting a Computer Club

Finally I am getting around to starting a computer club in our Myrtle Beach home. We will meet on a biweekly or monthly schedule. I will be the presenter at the first couple of meetings after which I hope other presentation volunteers will surface. I hope to present/have presented topics for beginners and more advanced at each meeting of the club. We will also have a "self help" session, with members presenting computer or networking problems that I or other members might have solutions for. At our first meeting I think I will do two short presentation, one for beginners on basic desktop and window management and one for all on problem solving via the web. Should be fun.

On another front, I continue to volunteer at the Socastee Library, giving a variety of Computer related courses in their computer equipped classroom. Tuesday June 16th I'm teaching "Maintaining Your Computer", Wednesday June 24th I'm teaching "Online Security" and sometime during the month (date not settled yet) will be "Computers 101".

Computing 101 - I'm Teaching Again

Well, I'm back to teaching again. I have volunteered to teach computer use topics at our local library in South Carolina. Oh, yes, we now live more there than we do in Randolph. We moved part time into our new SC home in January of last year. This year we plan to spend more time here. The library I'm teaching in is the Socastee Library.

Much to my surprise, this Myrtle Beach branch library is only five years old, is larger and much better equiped than the library in Randolph, NJ. In addition to some 18 or so computers on the floor, there is a classroom with a dozen or more computers plus a screen and projector to show the teachers screen to the class. Fantastic. I'll be teaching the beginners class, computing 101, tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. I'm looking forward to it.

TV On Demand - The Web and TV Begin to Merge

If you have ever visited the web site of any of the major (or minor) TV networks you have discovered that they are beginning to make some of their past broadcasts available there. If you have a broadband (cable, DSL or FIOS for example) connection to the Internet from a computer less than five or so years old you can see shows that you might have missed or that you want to see again. All episodes of a very few shows might be available while others are missing completely or have a few recent shows available. To find this, you have to go individually to each networks site and hunt around. Now there is a better way!

WWW.Hulu.Com

I discovered this gem from a great article in the September 2008 edition of Wired Magazine and last night I watched a gem of an episode from a late 50's early 60's Western series (the hay day of the TV western) called "Have Gun, Will Travel". Fantastic! Hulu has struck deals with many (but not all, don't look for Oprah for example) networks and many film distributors as well to act as a hub for hosting and/or locating their content on the WWW. Enjoy!

Oh, and for a more recent development on the same topic, it looks like YouTube is now hosting and presenting widescreen HD video content. Now to view this you will need a high end broadband connection and a very recent medium to high end PC. Check out this example on YouTube. Give it a go to see if your broadband connection and PC are up to it.

Snopes and the Cell Phone Popcorn

Woah, it's been a long time since I updated this blog! The spirit has finally moved me!

Have you seen the eMail re popping popcorn with a cell phone? I got that eMail forwarded to me yesterday. Here is a quote from it:

This is enlightening!!!! Using a cell phone is like putting your head in a microwave, eh? Check this out! And we're supposed to believe that cell phones are safe?

Click on the word 'POPCORN' below and watch.

POPCORN

If you follow that link you will see a really frightening film clip showing popcorn exploding as it sits on a table next to several working cell phones. The obvious message is "if it does this to popcorn, imagine what it is doing to your brain". Hard to believe, but film doesn't lie, right? Well, anytime you get something forwarded to you that causes your eyebrows to lift in EITHER excitement or disbelief, it is a really good idea, before you forward the item to yet another group of people, to check out - is it true or not? One of the best sites to go to to do this is Snopes at WWW.Snopes.Com

If you go to Snopes and type the three words popcorn cell phone into the Snopes search bar and click on GO, you will turn up this entry: http://www.snopes.com/science/cookegg.asp Go there and read the entry after you read the rest of this paragraph. You will find that the first part of the Snopes entry is about "cooking eggs with a cell phone", an even scarier thought. You'll find the popcorn info if you scroll down to the bottom. A couple of the movie clips there will not work because (I think) they have been removed from the site they are linked from (Youtube). The CNN link, however, does work - and there you will find the real proof. If the CNN link doesn/t work when you try it, let me know by leaving a comment on this blog entry, thanks. For convenience, I'll put the CNN link here too (you'll see a comercial first, be patient, it is short): http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/tech/2008/07/09/carroll.cellphone.popcorn.cnn

Remember now, if a forwarded eMail sounds unbelievable, it probably is - check it out in Snopes. If if sounds like something you REALLY WANT TO BELIEVE be doubly sure to check it out in Snopes.

Creating Documents in Office 2007 to be Read By Users Of Older Office Versions

I'm writing this while watching a beautiful sunrise over the surf. The door is open and I can hear the rollers coming in. Ocean front rooms are cheap in South Carolina at this time of year. Temps are forecast in the 80's for the rest of the week. I sure hope the sleet and snow has melted when we get back on Monday.

I've been reading a bit re Office 2007. Office 2007 by default will save it's documents (when you tell it to save) in a format that cannot be read by older versions of office unless the owner of that older version does two things:

1. Has run "Office Update" (something similar to "Windows Update") to get all the latest updates from Microsoft.
2. Has downloaded software from Microsoft intended to enable them to read the new Office 2007 files

What this means is you could create a new Powerpoint presentation or Word document, send it to them as an attachment to an eMail and they would not be able to open the document on their machine.

Here is a link to an article on Microsoft's web site that explains the above in more detail

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/924074

The solution in the Microsoft article (see link above) is to have the receiver of your document take some action. There is also something you can do when you save the document that will assure you they will be able to read it: you can do a "save as" and save it in the older format. Here is a link to an article on the Binghampton University web site that tells you how to do that:

http://wiki.binghamton.edu/index.php/Using_Word_2007_%22sharing_documents_with_other_users_and_computers%22

Hope this Helps!

Denville Library Presentation De-Bugging and Tuning Up Your Computer

I will be giving my "De-Gunking Your Computer" presentation tonight (Wed, 3/14/2007) at 7:00 at the Denville NJ public library. After doing this presentation at the Randolph library I posted it on Slideshare where it has been viewed, to my amazement, over 400 times. I updated and made some additions to the Randolph presentation and have re-posted it (separately) for Denville. Note that there are many hyperlinks in the presentation that lead you to supporting information on the web. You can spot them by moving the mouse cursor around the screen to see if it changes shape. Most of the links are on words, some of them are on images. You can get to the Denville version of the presentation by clicking the following link:

http://www.slideshare.net/JimWhite/debugging-and-tuning-up-your-pc

Note: when you click on the above link you will go to a site called Slideshare and will see the first page of the presentation in a reduced size. To the bottom right of this first slide you will see the word "full". If you click on "full" a full screen window will open with the presentation in it. The four arrows at the bottom of the screen allow you to navigate. Their function, from left to right is:
1. go to first slide
2. go to next slide
3. go to previous slide
4. go to last slide

Note that on the initial screen (the one that shows a small size slide) directly below the slide (scroll down) there is a place to leave comments. Please do so.

I hope you find the presentation useful. Enjoy!

Vista Is Here

Whoa, it's been a long time since my last post! Chalk that up to a lot of commotion in my life since then. Specifically, we sold our house and moved to a townhouse. At the same time we continue to make plans (we now have a signed contract) to build in Myrtle Beach. While it only takes two sentences to say that, to live it is a different matter altogether. At any rate, things are getting a little back to normal.

Microsoft's new operating system, Vista is here and available. If you already have a computer and are considering an upgrade, don't. Wait until Microsoft issues it's first massive set of fixes (referred to as a "fix pack"). Wait a month after that to make sure the fixes don't need fixes and then consider an upgrade but only if you are doing so to take advantage of some specific Vista capability. Don't upgrade for the sake of upgrading, it's not worth the aggravation you face with any operating system upgrade. If you are buying a new computer and it comes with Vista preloaded, beware of the "minimum system requirements" your system supplier will provide. As a rule of thumb, you should seriously consider doubling the system memory recommended.