One Additional Defense Against Email Viruses

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

This simple tip should not be a substitute for anti-virus programs and keeping them updated, but can be an affective adjunct to anti-virus programs.

As always, remember that viruses can come from friends and family. Although not on purpose, if a friend or family email buddy received a virus unknowingly, they will propagate the virus unknowingly as well.

Because we have a tendency to look at email attachments, institute this easy method of intercepting some of the most virulent of viruses…the Visual Basic Script virus or worm (VBS). Follow these steps carefully and verbatim:

1. Click on Start –> Programs –> Accessories –> Notepad
2. Type: Visual Basic Script test document
3. Click on File and Save
4. In the file name box type: vbstestdoc.vbs
5. Remember where you are saving this file by looking in the ‘look in’ box at the top and then click Save
6. Close Notepad
7. Go to where you saved the file in step 5
8. Hold down the Shift key on your keyboard as you RIGHT Click on the vbstestdoc.vbs file
9. Click on Open With from the menu
10. Scroll through the list and click once on Notepad
11. Make sure the box that says “always use this program IS checked and then click OK

This routine will force any scripts that you accidentally download or click on to open harmlessly in Notepad.

Then you will want to delete the culprit if it indeed is a VBS script file.

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Use Email Filters to Organize Email

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

If you receive more than a few email per day, you could probably benefit from using email filters. All major email programs can be used to look at your email as it comes in and then shift it to a designated folder or even delete it.

Before starting to use a filter, set up some email folders to organize your messages. Simply having an Inbox that collects all incoming mail can be cumbersome to work with and makes it easy to lose important messages.

In my email program, I have set up over 25 folders that collect and organize everything from listener mail, newsletters, daily tips that I receive, mail from specific contacts and more. When I check for email, the program applies the rules (filters) that I have setup and shifts the mail to where it belongs.

And one of my favorite features of Microsoft Outlook is the ability to Right Click on an email and choose to add the message’s sender to my junk email list, thus preventing me from ever seeing a message from the offender again.

If you are using Microsoft Outlook Express, Click on Tools –> Message Rules –> Mail. Click on New, follow the three step rule process and then name your rule (filter). You can add as many rules as you like to your email.

If you use Netscape Communicator, Click on Edit –> Message Filters. Then click on New and set up the form to match the rule you want. Again, you can create as many filters as you want.

Microsoft Outlook uses a Rules Wizard in the Tools menu. I like the step-by-step approach it takes.

AOL users can set up simple rules in the Preferences section, but cannot achieve the power available in the above programs.

Keep visiting our web site for specific instructions on how to set up the filters exactly in each program.

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The efficient way to email your digital photos

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

I often get emails from family or friends who have recently been on vacation or been involved in some other event and they want to share a handful of photos with everyone in their address book. Some of the email works out great, but other email doesn’t quite make it through the way sender intended.

Emailing photos can be one of the most troublesome things you can do with your email for several reasons.

1. Non-resized photos can take a long time to upload to send through email on a dialup line.
2. Non-resized photos can take a long time to download for everyone you send the email to. Nothing is more aggravating than waiting 20 minutes for a photo to download so you can read your email, only to find out that the photo is of a funny position that the cat fell asleep in.
3. Every email program handles attachments differently and some people on your list may call you for tech support when they can’t get the photos you sent.

There is a much better solution for sending photos via email.

Using the following system there is no limit to the number of photos you send in an email, recipients don’t have to wait for them to download, and the email doesn’t take up any more space on the hard drive than a typical email.

The system I am referring to is the online photo album.

Ofoto, Shutterfly, Club Photo, Fotki, andYahoo Photos are just a few of the sites where you can upload your photos for public or private viewing. Using these sites you can upload your photos then send everyone on your list a link to the online album. From there, they can view slideshows, order prints or photo gifts, or simply enjoy the photos at their leisure.

Best of all it’s free. Simply go to the website of your choice and setup a free account using a user name, password, email address and very little personal information. The services will offer an ‘upload option’ to get your pictures from your computer to the service. As with emailing photos, if you are on dial-up Internet, be aware that uploading full resolution photos can take some time.

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Geocaching

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

Computers, the Internet, GPS, and Hiking for Treasure

A customer of mine (Bill) introduced me to a  fast growing sport called geocaching. Geocaching makes use of Global Positioning Satellites (GPS), the Internet and hiking to find ‘treasures’ all around the world!

GPS uses a series of satellites (24 to be exact) to triangulate a GPS users position. One must use a GPS receiver to utilize the system and access the satellites. Cost for a GPS receiver starts at $90. The signal will give you (within 1-3 meters of accuracy) your latitude, longitude, altitude, speed and direction. Learn more about GPS and how it works by clicking here.

Geocaching starts on the Internet. You can search for a cache using the search engine and a city name or zip code at Geocaching.com. Once you find a cache you would like to find, note its coordinates and trail description. Some are extremely easy to get to and find, others require more strenuous hikes, so be sure to read the details. Then you use maps, your GPS and treasure hunting skills to locate the cache.

When you arrive at a cache, open the container and leave a small item and take a small item or simply sign and date the log book and carefully put the cache back in its original position for the next treasure hunter to find. Upon returning home, make sure to log in your visit back at the geocaching web site.

Some great web sites that will help you have a successful ‘hunt’ include:

Geocaching started in Oregon in May of 2000. Today there are more than 140,000 caches in nearly 214 countries. In any given week, geocaching.com records more than 70,000 logs from geocachers world wide.

My family loves going geocaching on weekends and even vacations. We shared information about this great sport with our family and friends who all now enjoy this fun sport as well.

Geocaching provides a great way to mix technology, family and friends, and nature. Check out geocaching.com and learn more about how you can get started in this exciting (and addicting) sport.

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Fight Spy and Adware

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

Fight Spy and Adware
In the last twelve months, a new menace has invaded our computers via the Internet. Different than a virus, but equally as irritating, we need to be watching out for and fighting against spy and adware.

Spy and adware are little programs that install themselves on our computers and use up a great deal of our memory and processing power. Sometimes they are installed by us using some flaky software downloads (like Kazaa, Gator, etc). Sometimes they get installed by just visiting some less than upstanding web sites. Either way, we don’t want them on our systems. They produce gobs of pop-up ads, slow our computers down to a crawl and in some cases overtake our ability to even browse the web.

You have probably heard us talk about two different spyware removers; AdAware and SpyBot Search and Destroy. Both are free and available in the Links and Resources section of our web site. Once installed, run these tools about once per month or when you feel that pop-ups have gotten out of control or your system seems slow again.

These programs search through the computer and find the little crevices and cracks where they hide. After the scan is through, the program will provide a report of what has been found and give you the choice to delete or quarantine its findings. I have had no problem in deleting anything that it has found.

Lastly, like anti-virus software, these programs need to be updated from time-to-time so that they can search for and delete the newest threats.

As mentioned above, we are often our own worst enemy when it comes to spy or adware. Remember and follow these simple rules to reduce the occurrence of a polluted system:

  • Don’t download and install free programs that originate at a web site littered with pop-ups

  • Don’t buy or download software from a spam email

  • Avoid visiting "fringe" sites (sex sites, MLM or get-rich sites, etc)

  • Keep track of what children using your computer are downloading and which sites they are visiting as well.

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The efficient way to email your digital photos

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

by Adam Cochran

I often get emails from family or friends who have recently been on vacation or been involved in some other event and they want to share a handful of photos with everyone in their address book. Some of the email works out great, but other email doesn’t quite make it through the way sender intended.

Emailing photos can be one of the most troublesome things you can do with your email for several reasons.

  1. Non-resized photos can take a long time to upload to send through email on a dialup line.

  2. Non-resized photos can take a long time to download for everyone you send the email to. Nothing is more aggravating than waiting 20 minutes for a photo to download so you can read your email, only to find out that the photo is of a funny position that the cat fell asleep in.

  3. Every email program handles attachments differently and some people on your list may call you for tech support when they can’t get the photos you sent.

There is a much better solution for sending photos via email.

Using the following system there is no limit to the number of photos you send in an email, recipients don’t have to wait for them to download, and the email doesn’t take up any more space on the hard drive than a typical email.

The system I am referring to is the online photo album.

Ofoto, Shutterfly, Club Photo, Fotki, and Yahoo Photos are just a few of the sites where you can upload your photos for public or private viewing. Using these sites you can upload your photos then send everyone on your list a link to the online album. From there, they can view slideshows, order prints or photo gifts, or simply enjoy the photos at their leisure.

Best of all it’s free. Simply go to the website of your choice and setup a free account using a user name, password, email address and very little personal information. The services will offer an ‘upload option’ to get your pictures from your computer to the service. As with emailing photos, if you are on dial-up Internet, be aware that uploading full resolution photos can take some time.

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eBay – Useful, Fun, and Safe

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

eBay is the online auction juggernaut where you can buy and sell practically anything. When I talk with someone who hasn’t tried eBay, I commonly hear that the person is scared of getting ‘taken’. With some background information and a little common sense, you can enjoy eBay like more than 95 million people currently do.

Last year (2003), eBay reported net revenue of over $2 billion dollars. The service carried 971 million auction listings last year that generated $24 billion dollars in sales to the auction holders.

The best way to get acquainted with eBay is to visit their web site and use their search engine to search for something you may be thinking of buying or selling. You will get immediate results of the items currently for bid. To bid on an item, you must sign up as an eBay member. This is a free service and is the only way you can bid on an auction. The process is painless and secure. Once you sign up, you can start bidding on items or selling your own.

The typical eBay auction lasts seven days. Most of an auctions activity occurs on the final day of an auction. When shopping with eBay, make sure you utilize the information found in eBay’s feedback system. This system provides an avenue for bidders and sellers to share a brief description of their dealings with each other. This helps you determine whether or not you feel comfortable entering a transaction with them and it works quite well.

When selling an item on eBay, I like to use the eBay Advanced Search to search for completed auctions matching the item I want to sell. Doing so allows me to determine approximately how much I can expect to get from selling my item. This information gives you a better shot and picking your starting bid and thus a sale.

The most common way to pay and receive payment for auction items is PayPal. PayPal (now part of eBay) allows buyers and sellers to use their credit card VERY securely to make transactions without the other party ever seeing the number. It has turned out to be an extremely smooth and safe way of doing business online.

To learn more about eBay buying and selling, visit their web site and browse their auctions and read the “Getting Started” section. I also periodically feature eBay as a topic at our local computer users group. Click here to read those notes and obtain my free 9 page handout on “Buying and Selling with eBay”.

On this week’s show we interviewed Jim “Griff” Griffith, one of the world’s leading experts on everything eBay. He has even written a book, The Official eBay Bible, designed to help people find their way around the world of eBay. It is well worth the read whether you are just starting out or have been involved with eBay for years and just want to learn more.

If you just want to learn more about how eBay got started and where it is heading, checkout The Perfect Store, another great book all about eBay’s progress from a one man operation into the micro-economy it is today.

Good luck and happy eBaying!

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Does your computer get stuck?

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

Actually, I should say, "does your web browser get stuck?" Occasionally, we may click on a link from a web page and the browser just sits there and the page never appears. Here’s the remedy… When you experience the above symptom while browsing about the Internet, simply click on the "stop" button at the top of your browser (traffic light in Netscape, circle with an ‘X’ in it for Internet Explorer and AOL). Then, immediately click on the link again and your browser should kick into gear and take you where you want to go. One caution: do NOT use this technique while shopping on the Internet. Pushing the ‘reload’ button or stopping and starting a transaction could result in multiple orders of the same item!

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Cookies…are they dangerous, harmless or do they just taste good?

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

Cookies are small (very small…hundreds of cookies will take up less than a tenth of a megabyte on your hard drive) text files that are deposited on our computer systems by some web sites. For example, the polling service I use for our listener poll will deposit a cookie on your hard drive to prevent more than
one vote per question, but that is all it does.

In the majority of cases, cookies pose no threat to you, your computer, or your privacy. Cookies contain as little data as your Internet providers identifying address or your name and preferences for a web site (like Amazon.com or a personalized Yahoo! page). There have been instances of some advertising
companies attempting to ‘track’ your whereabouts on the web, but again it is more your ‘number’ than you and the data collected is for statistical information only. And to reiterate, cookie files take up a minuscule amount of your hard drive space.

All that being said, here are some great resources for you to learn more about cookies and how to deal with them:

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Change the Font Size of Your Browser Text

Posted on December 30, 2005 by Rick

Text on certain web pages can be either too small or too big. Using either Netscape Communicator or Internet Explorer, you have control over this potential problem using the font size command.

These font adjustments don’t have to be absolute. Change them as the need arises since there is a large disparity in the way web sites are formatted.

In Internet Explorer, change the font size by:

1. Click on View from the menus
2. Click on Text Size
3. Click on any of the options listed (from smallest to largest)

In Netscape Communicator, change the font size by:

1. Click on Edit from the menus
2. Click on Preferences
3. Click on Fonts under the Appearance section on the left
4. Change the font size for both the variable width and and fixed Width font
5. Click OK

With Netscape, you can also control font display size by clicking on the View menu and then Increase font or Decrease font options. Or on the keyboard using: Ctrl+] and Ctrl+[ respectively on the keyboard.

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