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Front Range PC Users Group Newsletter k-Byte |
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| v. 22, n. 3/4 March/April 2005 | Users Helping Users |
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Contents 1 What Is Shareware? - Dan Housley 2 About k-Byte 4 21 Google Shortcuts, Tips and Tricks 6 Some Definitions About Threats To Your PC - James Alexander 8 Mangled Measurements - Humor 10 FTC Names Its Dirty Dozen 14 Calendar of Events 16 April/May Calendars 18 Membership Application 19 Royal Canadian Mounted Police Are Very Fast 19 Why Can't I Open This File? - Brian K. Lewis 22 Hard Drive House Keeping Is Vital - Dennis Schulman 25 Beware Of Phishing Scams! - Nowshade Kabir 26 Cut URL's Down To Size 29 Karen's Replicator 30 Trading Post 31 FRPCUG Contacts What Is Shareware? by Dan Housley Shareware is software that you can try before you buy. Software developers post trial versions of their software on websites. Consumers can then download the trial version to their computer and evaluate it. If the consumer likes the software they can purchase it. Shareware is also called try before you buy. Today almost every big software company including Microsoft, Winzip, and AOL use trial versions or a form of shareware to market their software. Why is shareware better than any other marketing method? Shareware is a good way to market software. It allows consumers to evaluate an application prior to making a purchase decision. They can easily determine if it meets their business or personal needs, which usually results to a satisfied customer. In addition because shareware companies are often small they can provide personalized service that is not found in larger companies. Shareware also allows for instant gratification, there is no need to wait for a shipment. Consumers can download and use the software immediately. Freeware vs. Shareware. As you know shareware is a marketing method for software. Freeware is also a way of marketing software. However, freeware is free so the developer does not ever request any money. Shareware is free to distribute but cannot be used for an unlimited amount of time, unless the developer is paid. Freeware can be used an unlimited amount of time and can be freely distributed; payment is not required. Many developers use freeware to draw attention to their shareware applications. What is software piracy? There are several kinds of software piracy. One kind of software piracy is hacking into software and disabling the copy protection. Software pirates then distribute or sell the hacked software. The developer does not receive any money for the software the hacker distributed. This is an infringement on the developer's copyright. Another technique used by hackers is to illegally obtain a registered copy of software. Pirates purchase the software once and use it on multiple computers. Purchasing software with a stolen credit card is another form of software piracy. Unfortunately there are many kinds of software piracy that has slowed the industry's growth. In order for developers to continue to develop software and provide support the software needs to be profitable. Registration Incentives. A registration incentive is something that makes the person using the shareware version of the software want to buy. There are a number of incentives developers use to encourage users to buy. One popular registration incentive is to limit the time of the trial version. This is clever because then the user can't use the shareware version forever. It encourages them to buy the software so they can continue to use it when the trial period is over. Often shareware versions will have "grayed out" features on the menu that the consumer can see, but not use. Typically there is a pop-up windows in the software encouraging users to register in order to take advantage of the additional features. This is a popular registration method because if the person wants to do more things with the program, then they are forced to buy the registered version of the software. Another innovative registration incentive shareware developers use allows customers to receive discounts on other software once they have purchased the registered version. Developers also provide support incentives. The shareware version of software will have everything the registered version has, however, if a person buys the registered version of the software he/she will receive tech support, newsletters, and upgrades. Developers can also limit the number of times you can use the shareware version of the product. The trial version may expire after 10 uses meaning the user has to register if they wish to continue using the software. Shareware now and how the term changed. Though the meaning of the term shareware has not changed the perception of shareware has evolved since it began. At first when you had a shareware program there was a note that asked for a donation. Now you are required to pay for the registered version of the shareware program. The shareware industry has also evolved and grown into a billion dollar industry. About the Author: Dan Housley is currently a student interning with NotePage, Inc. http://www.notepage.net developers of SMS and wireless messaging software and Software Marketing Resource http://www.softwaremarketingresource.com . Published bi-monthly, k-Byte is the official newsletter of the Front Range Personal Computer Users Group (FRPCUG): our mailing address is PMB 152, 305 W. Magnolia, Fort Collins, Colorado 80521. Opinions expressed in k-Byte are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the group or its members. Publication of information in k-Byte constitutes no guarantee of accuracy. Use of any information found in this publication is at the sole risk of the user. Neither k-Byte, nor its officers, nor k-Byte, nor its editors or contributors assume any liability for damages resulting from use of information in this publication. Submissions Articles, letters and short items of interest on computer-related topics are welcome and encouraged. All items submitted for publication are subject to editing. Send your contribution to the editor via e-mail attachment or submit on disk. If you have questions about a submission, please contact the editor for information. Copyright k-Byte is copyrighted ©2005 by the Front Range Personal Computer Users Group. Unless otherwise noted, other nonprofit users groups may reprint or quote from any articles appearing in k-Byte without prior permission, provided that proper author and publication credits are given and that a copy of the publication in which the article appears is sent at no cost to k-Byte at the above mailing address. User groups wishing to exchange newsletters with FRPCUG are invited to send a copy of their newsletter together with an exchange request. IBM PC, OS/2, Compaq, MS-DOS, UNIX, Windows and other trademarks occasionally mentioned in k-Byte are registered trademarks of International Business Machines, Inc., Compaq Corporation, Microsoft, Digital Research, AT&T or their owners respectively. Neither FRPCUG nor its newsletter k-Byte are connected in any way with any manufacturer or seller. We, however, gratefully acknowledge sponsorship of our group by Data Service Center, Jim Becker, owner. Advertising Classified advertising is free to members for non-business ads. See "Trading Post" for pricing for camera-ready display ads. Charges for ad makeup from sketches, etc., are available on request. Deadline for camera-ready and classified ads is listed in the Calendar of Upcoming Events. Deadline for ad-makeup is the same as for articles. About FRPCUG FRPCUG is an independent nonprofit computer society, so incorporated with the State of Colorado and open to anyone interested in MS-DOS, Windows, or UNIX/LINUX microcomputers. Its purpose is to provide an educational and scientific forum of mutual benefit for members of the micro-computer community. FRPCUG holds a monthly meeting and conducts various special interest groups (SIGS) and seminars. Members have voting privileges, subscription to k-Byte newsletter, SIGs and selected seminars. Annual dues are $25 for individual/family membership and $50 for corporate/group membership. Make quick searches even quicker with the right word. Use the search bar as a calculator. Track packages. Check flight status. Go shopping. Here's how. IF YOU KNOW the right syntax, you can home in on a short list of targeted search results. Here are some of the key search phrases and how to use them. A PLUS FOR + AND - TO MAKE GOOGLE include stop words (common words that it would otherwise ignore, such as the), you can use a + (plus sign). To make Google exclude stop words, replace the + with a - (minus sign). (With all syntax words, make sure there is no space after either sign or after a colon.) Example: To find keyboard shortcuts in Microsoft Word, type key-board+shortcut+word. Replace word with any other application name to get keyboard shortcuts for it, such as OE (for Outlook Express), Quicken, and Acrobat. YOU ARE INTITLED INTITLE: Tells Google to search for just words found in Web page titles. Example: intitle:dark chocolate CAUGHT IN THE WEB INURL: Google looks only in URLs of Web pages. Example: inurl:baseball FILE FORMATS RULE FILETYPE: There are a number of file types searched by Google in addition to standard HTMLformatted pages. Example: Typing filetype:doc dark chocolate brings back only Word documents on the subject of dark chocolate. Similarly for other file types, only files created with the corresponding program are returned. Examples: ? Adobe Acrobat (pdf ) ? Lotus 1-2-3 (wkl, wk2, and so on) ? Microsoft Excel (xis) ? Microsoft PowerPoint (ppt) ? Rich Text Format (rtf ) ? Shockwave Flash (swf) ? Text (ans, txt) TEXT SUPPORT INTEXT: Google searches only in the body text of Web pages - not in links, URLs, or titles. Example: intext:pcworld or intext:pcworld.com CITE THE SITE SITE: Use this bit of syntax when you want to limit Google's search to a particular site. Example: site:pcworld.com Microsoft mouse would offer only references to Microsoft mice that are on PC World's Web site. G00GLE IS MORE than a search engine. It is a dictionary, a calculator, an almanac, a phone hook, and much more. Here's how to harness its other powers. TOP 10 WORDS GOOGLE LIMITS SEARCHES to only the first ten words entered, so keep your search phrases as short as possible. Google searches on words in the order they appear, so book paper would get you a different result than paper book. DEFINITE DEFINITIONS DEFINE: Find definitions to words by typing define:word. Only the definition is returned. If you want sites based on the word as well, drop the colon. Example: define word BUILT-IN CALCULATOR USING THE GOGGLE calculator is as easy as 2+2. Just enter the numbers you'd like to calculate, without the equal sign. Example: 2+2 returns with 2+2=4. For multiplication, use an asterisk (); for division, use a forward slash (/). You can also use Google's calculator to query higher-level mathematics. Go to http://www.google.com/help/calculator.html for directions. MAPS IN A SECOND TYPE map location (where location is a city and/or state) for your choice of maps. Or do a more exacting search by entering a U.S. street address, city, state, and/or zip code. (For a region map enter a phone area code.) Example: 123 main street san francisco ca INSTANT STOCK QUOTES ENTER A TICKER symbol for a company or mutual fund on the New York Stock Exchange, Nasdaq, or American Stock Exchange for a current quote. THE BIG PHONE BOOK ENTER AN INDIVIDUAL residential phone number (312-555-1212) to get a listed address (and map), or enter a first name (or initial), last name, and city to get the number, if listed. You can also zero in by adding the area code or zip code as well. Don't have an address? List the last name and a zip code or city and state to get a search result. GOGGLE'S GOT YOUR NUMBER PACKAGE TRACKING: Enter your tracking number from Federal Express, United Parcel Service, or the United States Postal Service. UNIVERSAL PRODUCT CODES: Enter the UPC number to get information on the product and its maker. FLIGHT NUMBERS: Enter the airline name and flight number for status. Example: United airlines 150 or usair 150 GOOGLE HACK AND GUIDE USING THE GOOGLE programming code (API), a number of aficionados have come up with Google applica-tions. Check out Google News Map and Google Word Color at Douwe Osinga's blog (FIND PCWORLD.COM/43858). A cornucopia of Google tips is offered at O'Reilly (FIND.PCWORLD.COM/43856), the site of the publisher of a trio of Google books: Google Hacks, Google: The Missing Manual, and Google Pocket Guide. HOW LUCKY CAN YOU GET THE "I'M FEELING LUCKY" button next to the "Google Search" button takes you directly to the first Web page that would be listed on a regular Google search results page. It is best used as a shortcut to a site that will clearly be the first result. HOW TO SEARCH IN FROOGLE FROOGLE, GOOGLE'S shopping site, targets the item or stores you are looking for more precisely than if you performed the same search in the Google search bar. But you can still get a large number of hits if an item is sold on a legion of Web sites. To narrow your search even more in Froogle, you can search by a specific store. Example: store:macys - returns with everything the store sells. Add an item before, and the search is more specific: chocolate store:macys. Once you get the results, Froogle lets you narrow your query by price range, topic area, and more in a separate pane on the left side of the results page. Nibbles & Bytes newsletter, January, 2005 by James Alexander Malware is a new term, which is descriptive of any software, script, macro, or code written to provide some malicious effect on the owner of a computing system or device. What is Phishing or Spoofing? "Phishing" or "Spoofing" e-mails are made to look like they are sent from reputable companies but are actually sent by cyber-criminals. These types of e-mails are sent to trick consumers into divulging sensitive information so that unlawful charges can be made on the consumers' accounts. Responding to "phishing" or "spoofing" e-mails will put your accounts and personal information at risk; they will link you to an imitation copy of a legitimate web page to trick you into providing sensitive personal information including passwords. Identifying a Phish or Spoof E-mail Phishing e-mails will usually urge you to "update" or "validate" your account information and will often threaten some dire consequence for not responding to them. Be on the lookout for poor grammar or typographical errors. Many phishing e-mails are translated from other languages or are sent without being proofread, and as a result may contain bad grammar or typographical errors. Most ISPs use a variety of means to ensure that the e-mail from their support services is authentic and can be trusted. Find out from your ISP or e-mail service what methods they use to try to protect you, and provide trusted services. Also find out how your ISP or e-mail provider wants you to do with phishing, spam, or any other attempts to give them a bad name or that would give you personal grief. What do I do if I get a Phishing E-mail? Primarily, if you do not do business with the supposed services with the e-mail address you have gotten a phish, then delete or forward to a reporting location. If you get an e-mail that asks for sensitive information, do not reply or click on the link in the message. When possible, you should avoid clicking links in the e-mail. Instead of clicking the link, (THIS IS IMPORTANT) close your browser session entirely, then open a new browser session. Type the URL for the bank or other place of personal business into the address area of your Internet browser. At no time should you cut and paste the link included in the message. There are new tricks designed to even change the URL for your favorites or bookmarks to a phisher's address. What Should I do if I Have Become a Victim of Fraud? If you have responded to a scam message and given out your details, you should report it immediately to your services. If you have given out any bank or credit card information, you should contact those companies as well immediately. To learn more about what to do if you have given out your personal financial information, the Federal Trade Commission has issued a warning about these identity theft scams. They suggest the following: If you get an e-mail that warns you, with little or no notice, that an account of yours will be shut down unless you reconfirm your billing information, do not reply or click on the link in the e-mail. Instead, contact the company cited in the e-mail using a telephone number or Web site address you know to be genuine. Avoid e-mailing personal and financial information; Always keep your password secure. Never share your password with anyone; Always review your credit card and bank account statements as soon as you receive them to determine whether there are any unauthorized charges. If your credit card or bank statement is late by more than a couple of days, call your credit card company or bank to confirm your billing address and account balances. For more information on how to avoid e-mail scams, please visit the Federal Trade Commission's website at http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/alerts/phishingalrt.htm Protecting Your Computer Microsoft recommends that you keep your computer updated with the latest security patches for Windows. Without the latest security patches, your computer may be vulnerable to any of the following: Identity theft; Worms and Trojans which can destroy data on your hard drive or send your personal information to third parties without your knowledge; tracking programs that silently monitor your online activity and report it without your knowledge; or unauthorized use of your computer to store illegal content or to send bulk mail illegally. Microsoft has a free CD available with the latest security patches for Windows. Visit http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/updates/sp2/cdorder/en_us/default.mspx to request the free CD from Microsoft or download the latest updates by visiting the Microsoft website at http://www.microsoft.com/security/default.mspx E-mail Virus Protection Computer viruses are commonly transmitted among computers via e-mail. Many e-mail services either provide or offer automatic scans for viruses and spam blocking using state-of-the-art technology before you download them to your computer. E-mail messages you send are also scanned to notify you of potential e-mail viruses on your computer and to protect other computers from becoming infected. However, viruses continue to change and advance, to the point even the e-mail services are unable to prevent some of the newest and more dangerous virus to get through. To further protect yourself from harmful computer viruses, we recommend that you install anti-virus software on your computer and run a virus scan on a regular basis. BlueChips Magazine, March , 2005 1. Ratio of an igloo's circumference to its diameter = Eskimo Pi 2. 2000 pounds of Chinese soup = Won ton 3. 1 millionth of a mouthwash = 1 microscope 4. Time between slipping on a peel and smacking the pavement= 1 bananosecond 5. Weight an evangelist carries with God = 1 billigram 6. Time it takes to sail 220 yards at 1 nautical mile perhour = Knotfurlong 7. 365.25 days of drinking low calorie beer = 1 Lite year 8. 16.5 feet in the Twilight Zone = 1 Rod Serling 9. Half a large intestine = 1 semicolon 10. 1,000,000 aches = 1 megahurtz 11. Basic unit of laryngitis - 1 hoarsepower 12. Shortest distance between two jokes - a straight line 13. 453.6 graham crackers = 1 pound cake 14. 1 million microphones = 1 megaphone 15. 1 million bicycles = 1 megacycles 16. 365.25 days = 1 unicycle 17. 2000 mockingbirds = two kilomockingbirds 18. 10 cards = 1 decacard 19. 52 cards = 1 deckacard 20. 1 kilogram of falling figs = 1 fig Newton 21. 1000 grams of wet socks = 1 literhosen 22. 1 millionth of a fish = 1 microfiche 23. 1 trillion pins = 1 terrapin 24. 10 rations = 1 decaration 25. 100 rations = 1 C-ration 26. 2 monograms = 1 diagram 27. 8 nickels = 2 paradigms 28. 2.4 statute miles of intravenous surgical tubing at Yale University Hospital = 1 I.V. League from the LangaList 12 Scams Most Likely to Arrive Via Bulk Email Email boxes are filling up with more offers for business opportunities than any other kind of unsolicited commercial email. That's a problem, according to the Federal Trade Commission, because many of these offers are scams. In response to requests from consumers, the FTC asked email users to forward their unsolicited commercial email to the agency for an inside look at the bulk email business. FTC staff found that more often than not, bulk email offers appeared to be fraudulent, and if pursued, could have ripped-off unsuspecting consumers to the tune of billions of dollars. The FTC has identified the 12 scams that are most likely to arrive in consumers' email boxes. The "dirty dozen" are: 1. Business opportunities These business opportunities make it sound easy to start a business that will bring lots of income without much work or cash outlay. The solicitations trumpet unbelievable earnings claims of $140 a day, $1,000 a day, or more, and claim that the business doesn't involve selling, meetings, or personal contact with others, or that someone else will do all the work. Many business opportunity solicitations claim to offer a way to make money in an Internet-related business. Short on details but long on promises, these messages usually offer a telephone number to call for more information. In many cases, you'll be told to leave your name and telephone number so that a salesperson can call you back with the sales pitch. The scam: Many of these are illegal pyramid schemes masquerading as legitimate opportunities to earn money. 2. Bulk email Bulk email solicitations offer to sell you lists of email addresses, by the millions, to which you can send your own bulk solicitations. Some offer software that automates the sending of email messages to thousands or millions of recipients. Others offer the service of sending bulk email solicitations on your behalf. Some of these offers say, or imply, that you can make a lot of money using this marketing method. The problem: Sending bulk email violates the terms of service of most Internet service providers. If you use one of the automated email programs, your ISP may shut you down. In addition, inserting a false return address into your solicitations, as some of the automated programs allow you to do, may land you in legal hot water with the owner of the address's domain name. Several states have laws regulating the sending of unsolicited commercial email, which you may unwittingly violate by sending bulk email. Few legitimate businesses, if any, engage in bulk email marketing for fear of offending potential customers. 3. Chain letters You're asked to send a small amount of money ($5 to $20) to each of four or five names on a list, replace one of the names on the list with your own, and then forward the revised message via bulk email. The letter may claim that the scheme is legal, that it's been reviewed or approved by the government; or it may refer to sections of U.S. law that legitimize the scheme. Don't believe it. The scam: Chain letters-traditional or high-tech-are almost always illegal, and nearly all of the people who participate in them lose their money. The fact that a "product" such as a report on how to make money fast, a mailing list, or a recipe may be changing hands in the transaction does not change the legality of these schemes. 4. Work-at-home schemes Envelope-stuffing solicitations promise steady income for minimal labor-for example, you'll earn $2 each time you fold a brochure and seal it in an envelope. Craft assembly work schemes often require an investment of hundreds of dollars in equipment or supplies, and many hours of your time producing goods for a company that has promised to buy them. The scam: You'll pay a small fee to get started in the envelope-stuffing business. Then, you'll learn that the email sender never had real employment to offer. Instead, you'll get instructions on how to send the same envelope-stuffing ad in your own bulk emailings. If you earn any money, it will be from others who fall for the scheme you're perpetuating. And after spending the money and putting in the time on the craft assembly work, you are likely to find promoters who refuse to pay you, claiming that your work isn't up to their "quality standards." 5. Health and diet scams Pills that let you lose weight without exercising or changing your diet, herbal formulas that liquefy your fat cells so that they are absorbed by your body, and cures for impotence and hair loss are among the scams flooding email boxes. The scam: These gimmicks don't work. The fact is that successful weight loss requires a reduction in calories and an increase in physical activity. Beware of case histories from "cured" consumers claiming amazing results; testimonials from "famous" medical experts you've never heard of; claims that the product is available from only one source or for a limited time; and ads that use phrases like "scientific breakthrough," "miraculous cure," "exclusive product," "secret formula," and "ancient ingredient." 6. Effortless income The trendiest get-rich-quick schemes offer unlimited profits exchanging money on world currency markets; newsletters describing a variety of easy-money opportunities; the perfect sales letter; and the secret to making $4,000 in one day. The scam: If these systems worked, wouldn't everyone be using them? The thought of easy money may be appealing, but success generally requires hard work. 7. Free goods Some email messages offer valuable goods-for example, computers, other electronic items, and long-distance phone cards-for free. You're asked to pay a fee to join a club, then told that to earn the offered goods, you have to bring in a certain number of participants. You're paying for the right to earn income by recruiting other participants, but your payoff is in goods, not money. The scam: Most of these messages are covering up pyramid schemes, operations that inevitably collapse. Almost all of the payoff goes to the promoters and little or none to consumers who pay to participate. 8. Investment opportunities Investment schemes promise outrageously high rates of return with no risk. One version seeks investors to help form an offshore bank. Others are vague about the nature of the investment, stressing the rates of return. Many are Ponzi schemes, in which early investors are paid off with money contributed by later investors. This makes the early investors believe that the system actually works, and encourages them to invest even more. Promoters of fraudulent investments often operate a particular scam for a short time, quickly spend the money they take in, then close down before they can be detected. Often, they reopen under another name, selling another investment scam. In their sales pitch, they'll say that they have high-level financial connections; that they're privy to inside information; that they'll guarantee the investment; or that they'll buy back the investment after a certain time. To close the deal, they often serve up phony statistics, misrepresent the significance of a current event, or stress the unique quality of their offering-anything to deter you from verifying their story. The scam: Ponzi schemes eventually collapse because there isn't enough money coming in to continue simulating earnings. Other schemes are a good investment for the promoters, but no for participants. 9. Cable descrambler kits For a small sum of money, you can buy a kit to assemble a cable descrambler that supposedly allows you to receive cable television transmissions without paying any subscription fee. The scam: The device that you build probably won't work. Most of the cable TV systems in the U.S. use technology that these devices can't crack. What's more, even if it worked, stealing service from a cable television company is illegal. 10. Guaranteed loans or credit, on easy terms Some email messages offer home-equity loans that don't require equity in your home, as well as solicitations for guaranteed, unsecured credit cards, regardless of your credit history. Usually, these are said to be offered by offshore banks. Sometimes they are combined with pyramid schemes, which offer you an opportunity to make money by attracting new participants to the scheme. The scams: The home equity loans turn out to be useless lists of lenders who will turn you down if you don't meet their qualifications. The promised credit cards never come through, and the pyramid money-making schemes always collapse. 11. Credit repair Credit repair scams offer to erase accurate negative information from your credit file so you can qualify for a credit card, auto loan, home mortgage, or a job. The scam: The scam artists who promote these services can't deliver. Only time, a deliberate effort, and a personal debt repayment plan will improve your credit. The companies that advertise credit repair services appeal to consumers with poor credit histories. Not only can't they provide you with a clean credit record, but they also may be encouraging you to violate federal law. If you follow their advice by lying on a loan or credit application, misrepresenting your Social Security number, or getting an Employer Identification Number from the Internal Revenue Service under false pretenses, you will be committing fraud. 12. Vacation prize promotions Electronic certificates congratulating you on "winning" a fabulous vacation for a very attractive price are among the scams arriving in your email. Some say you have been "specially selected" for this opportunity. The scam: Most unsolicited commercial email goes to thousands or millions of recipients at a time. Often, the cruise ship you're booked on may look more like a tug boat. The hotel accommodations likely are shabby, and you may be required to pay more for an upgrade. Scheduling the vacation at the time you want it also may require an additional fee. The FTC works for the consumer to prevent fraudulent, deceptive and unfair business practices in the marketplace and to provide information to help consumers spot, stop and avoid them. To file a complaint or to get free information on consumer issues, visit http://www.ftc.gov or call toll-free, 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357); TTY: 1-866-653-4261. The FTC enters Internet, telemarketing, identity theft and other fraud-related complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to hundreds of civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad. - IMPORTANT NOTICE - FRPCUG meetings are held at the Fort Collins Senior Center. Check below for directions to the Senior Center. April General Forum Meeting We will meet at the Fort Collins Senior Center on Tuesday, April 5 at 7:00 pm. Meeting Agenda 7:00 - 7:15 Announcements 7:15 - 8:00 Anti-Virus, Firewalls & SPAM Control - A presentation on protecting your system from 'Vermin Ware." 8:00 - 8:15 Break 8:15 - 9:00 Open Forum May General Forum Meeting We will meet at the Fort Collins Senior Center on Tuesday, May 3 at 7:00 pm. Meeting Agenda 7:00 - 7:15 Announcements 7:15 - 8:00 Hard Drive Backup & System Protection - New technology tools to backup and protect your investment. 8:00 - 8:15 Break 8:15 - 9:00 Open Forum See you at the meetings! Directions The Fort Collins Senior Center is located at 1200 Raintree Drive. This site is situated at the northwest corner of the Shields and West Drake intersection, on the north side of the Raintree Shopping Center. Check the marquee at the main entrance for directions to the specific meeting room. Up-Coming SIG's, Seminars and Meetings Board Meeting FRPCUG's executive board meets on Wednesday of the week following the General Forum Meeting at 7:00 p.m. All members are welcome and are encouraged to attend. These meetings are held in the conference room behind the main desk at the Fort Coliins Senior Center 1200 Raintree Drive. New Technology SIG The LINUX SIG and the Telecommunications SIG have been combined to form the new Advanced Systems Support SIG. This SIG provides advanced support for all PC-related operating system and telecommunication issues. The meetings are held at 7:00 PM on the third Thursday of each month at the offices of Hub Enterprises: 1421 Webster Avenue in Fort Collins. For more information contact Chuck McJilton at 493-2987 or email telecomsig@jymis.com. Rocky Mountain Internet Users Group Meets on the second Tuesday of 'odd' months at NCAR in Boulder. Meetings start at 7:00 pm, but members are encouraged to arrive at 6:30 pm for informal networking and refreshments. NCAR is located in Boulder at 1850 Table Mesa Drive. For more information see the RMIUG Web site at: http://www.rmiug.org/. Upcoming FRPCUG Meetings Along with presentations of new hardware and software, we will certainly continue to present tips, hints, solutions, as well as what is new with Public Domain and Shareware offerings. If you have ideas for presentations which you would like to see at future General Forum meetings or seminars, please let us know. We would appreciate the input and opportunity to improve your meetings. Know of a another computer-related meeting in our area? Please let us know so we can post it here. 3 Daylight Savings Time Begins 5 FRPCUG General Forum Meeting 7:00PM 13 FRPCUG Board Meeting 7:00PM 21 New Technology SIG 7:00PM May 2005 3 FRPCUG General Forum Meeting 7:00PM 8 Mother's Day 11 FRPCUG Board Meeting 7:00PM 19 New Technology SIG 7:00PM 30 Memorial Day Toronto Globe & Mail March 30, 2004: In most of the Canadian Provinces, there is a policy of checking on any stalled vehicle on the highway when the temperatures drop in the single digits or below. One morning in March 2004 about 3AM RCMP Constable Bill Wisen was awakened to respond to such a call of a car off the shoulder on the Trans Canada Highway outside of Medicine Hat, Alberta. Constable Wisen located the car still running, stuck in deep snow alongside the highway. Pulling in behind it with his emergency lights on, Constable Wisen walked to the driver's door to find an older man passed out behind the wheel and a near empty bottle of vodka in the seat. He tapped on the window and the driver woke up, seeing the rotating lights in his rear view mirror and the RCMP Constable standing next to his car. The man panicked, and he jerked the gearshift into drive and hit the gas. The car's speedometer was showing 20-30-40 then 50 KPH, but its still stuck in the snow. Constable Wisen , having a sense of humor, began running in place next to the speeding but still stationary car. The driver was totally freaked thinking the officer is actually keeping up with him. This goes on for about 20 seconds when Constable Wisen yelled at the man ordering him to "pull over". This man obeyed and turned his wheel and stopped the engine. Once out of the car the drunken driver asked about the RCMPs' special training and just how can the Constable run 50 KPH. The man, Mr. Robert Duport of Medicine Hat was arrested still believing that an RCMP Constable had outrun his car. by Brian K. Lewis, Ph.D. Member of the Sarasota Personal Computer Users Group, Inc., Florida There are times in every computer user's life when the computer seems to be deliberately trying to increase your level of frustration. One of these little moments is when you receive a file from an associate and no matter what you do, you can't open it. The file can be a document, a picture, a spreadsheet or any number of other types. So why does this happen? And what does it have to do with these things called extensions or suffixes? Believe it or not, every file name on your computer has a three digit suffix. I know if you have never used any OS other than Windows you may never have seen this suffix or file extension. But they really do exist. If you open "My Computer" or Windows Explorer, select "Tools" from the menu. Then click on "Folder Options" and in that window click on "View". In this list some items are checked and some are not. If there is a check mark in the item "hide extensions for known file types", remove it. Then click on "apply to all folders". You will get a message telling you that the change will occur the next time you open a folder. Now open up any folder and look at the array of file extensions. Go from folder to folder and see how many different extensions you can find. So now you see that the number of different extensions seems to be limitless. Or at least enough to bring on some confusion. Why is there such a proliferation of these three figure suffixes? Let's look again at the "Tools" menu and "Folder Options". This time click on the tab for "File Types". The upper window lists "Registered file types". Now scroll through the list until you find "Adobe Acrobat Plug-in file". This has an extension of API and in the lower window you find a short explanation as to which program can open this file. In this case, Adobe Acrobat. Keep scrolling down through the list. You will probably find the BMP suffix. This is a picture file and usually opens with Microsoft Paint. However, on my computer it has been associated with IrfanView, a graphics viewer. Keep scrolling to get an idea of all the different file types and their extensions. If you click on enough different file types you will notice that each type is generally, but not always, associated with an application. When you click on the change button, the preferred application is listed at the top. You can change this to another application but then doubleclicking a file of that type may result in a error and it won't open. Applications such as Microsoft Word, Word Perfect, Microsoft Works, Excel, etc., can only open files that were created by them unless they have the appropriate translator for the document. This goes back to the reasons for the file suffixes. The suffix tells Windows what application is needed to open a particular file. Every application capable of creating files uses a different format for the file header and body information. This formatting allows Word, for example, to open a document that has specific margins, type face, printer assignment, etc. The same is true for other applications. Let's take a look at some of the definitions associated with the file structure of a Word file. FIB (File Information Block): The header of a Word file. Begins at offset 0 in the file. Gives the beginning offset and lengths of the document's text stream and subsidiary data structures within the file. Also stores other file status information.""DocFile: A Word docfile consists of a main stream, a summary information stream, a table stream, a data stream, and 0 or more object streams which contain private data for OLE 2.0 objects embedded within the Word document. Document: A named, multi-linked list of data structures, representing an ordered stream of text with properties that was produced by a user of Microsoft Word. Datastream: The stream within a Word docfile containing various data that hang off of characters in the main stream. For example, binary data describing in-line pictures and/or form fields. From these descriptions you can see that a Word document has a very specific structure that has to be read and interpreted in a specific way. Other applications can't read a Word file unless they have a translator for it. Even then, the translation may not accurately reflect the content and format of the original file. Another file format is that of database files. In a dBASE file, or a FoxPro file, the first byte identifies the version that created the file. Consequently, older versions can't read files created with newer versions of the program. For a number of years Microsoft created similar problems in Word documents by changing the file format every time a new version of Word was released. Another application that has it's own file formats is Microsoft Works. This application can create text documents, database files and spreadsheets. None of these files can be opened by other programs. The interesting thing is that Works can save files in Word format, WordPerfect format or RTF (rich text file). It can even open most of these formats. But Word and WordPerfect are unable to read files in the native Works format. Another problem exists with picture (graphic) files. Although your web browser should be able to read the most common formats, they have to be associated with the browser. If they are not, you will get an error when you attempt to open the file. Every graphic format has a different structure and may not always open in your photo software. The most common formats used on the web are GIF and JPG (jpeg). However, these are two very different formats. GIF is a compressed format that is referred to as a "lossless" compression. In other words, you don't lose any detail in the process of compression/decompression. However, GIF can not use more than 256 colors. That makes it less usable for color photos than other formats. However, for web page logos and other small graphics, GIF is ideal. The file size is small, so transmission time over the Internet is quite short. Photographs can be sent by e-mail using the JPG format which is very compressible. Jpegs can be compressed to 10% of their original size which greatly reduces transmission time. However, the greater the compression, the greater the loss of detail. Jpegs are a "lossy" format. The detail that is lost by compression can never be recovered. If the picture is important, you should always keep an uncompressed master in a safe location. Another "lossless" graphic format is TIF or TIFF (tagged image file format). This is the best format for color pictures and should be used to save the master copy of important photographs. The major problem with TIF files is that they are very large. Much larger than jpegs. For example, a file from a digital camera was 526 KB in its native format. When converted to TIF and compressed, it took up over 6 MB on the hard drive. However, not every graphics program can read TIFF files. If yours can't, then you need something like IrfanView, a free file viewer. So the answer to the original question is: you either don't have the application installed on your computer or you don't have the application associated with the file you are trying to open. Now, if you know the application that created the file and if you have it on your computer, you can solve the problem. You only need to associate the file with application. To do this open "My Computer" and select the "Tools" menu and "File Options". Click on the "File Types" tab and then scroll to the file extension for the file you want to open. Click on "Change" and select the application you want to use to open the file. All of this discussion assumes that the file has not been corrupted. Even minor damage to the header of file can keep it from being opened. Transmission of files between computers is always subject to possible damage. Now maybe those undamaged files can be opened with a little less frustration. KCC Newsletter, December, 2004 Dr. Lewis is a former university & medical school professor. He has been working with personal computers for more than 30 years. He can be reached via e-mail at bwsail@yahoo.com. A Few Scanning Tips by Wayne Fulton The most amazing collection of tips and help on the Internet on the subjects of optical scanning and the manipulation of graphic files. http://www.scantips.com/ by Dennis Schulman Tampa Bay Computer Society For those of you who surf the net on a regular basis - and that includes those who use dialup access as well as cable or DSL - it is absolutely crucial that you take your hard drive housekeeping more seriously than you ever thought necessary. Many users think that by having a suite of utilities, such as Norton or McAfee, that you are protected. You might be, but I seriously doubt it for so many reasons I won't go into it now except for three: You use auto update and auto scan. This requires that your computer be online at the time to run the auto update. In the case of cable or DSL, that is possible, but the computer has to be on at the time also. In the case of dialup, the computer won't go online unless your password is saved and used automatically. That, of course, defeats keeping friends and annoying children from messing up the computer without your knowledge. So, you might want to run your antivirus update manually, just to make certain it worked and there were no errors. The second reason is based on the fact that if you did not clean house before scanning, you risk the possibility of the antivirus finding a virus it could not delete or quarantine and you did not know it. You also risk the possibility of not knowing if the auto update was not run successfully for one of many reasons (and time and space won't permit that discussion at this time) and consequently your subsequent full system auto scan may not be able to recognize the latest nasties you have managed to acquire. There is a third, more obtuse, reason. If you don't really know if your system is truly clean and clear of all the bad stuff, how will you know what to do when you get a message that says something to the effect: "It has been determined that your computer has been sending messages infected with the ______ trojan horse virus to what appears to be the email listing of your address book. If you do not take appropriate action immediately, your email service will be discontinued. If your anti virus program has failed to protect you, please download the following trojan horse removal tool and run it immediately." So, here is a housekeeping procedure I use - which is manual - because then I am more certain that I know the status of my files than most of the "suite" programs. And it doesn't use much - if any - of my system resources except when I use it. Just in case you think you have all the utilities you need, let me comment that I am not an expert on your system, but I spend more time now than ever before on systems that have too many over-burdensome utilities that are truly unnecessary and in some cases more dangerous than what they claimed to be designed to do. What I am proposing is basically using 3 little free utilities that only work when invoked, along with utilities that already come with your computer. Run Disk Cleanup (under System Tools under Accessories on the Programs menu) and process all options (don't worry about compressed files, but do them at a later time when you have nothing else to do, since it could take quite a while if you haven't done it the first time.) Clear your browser cache (In Internet Explorer go to Tools, Internet Options. Delete cookies and delete all offline files.) In Netscape Communicator go to Edit, Preferences, Advanced, Clear Memory Cache and Clear Disk Cache) Open Windows Explorer (right-click on My Computer, select Explore), Select the folders/View option and select show all files except system files (You can leave it this way.) Find any folders called tmp, temp, or cookies. Unless you have a good working knowledge of what cookies you need or do not need, you probably don't need the contents of any of the temp, cookies, or temporary internet folders except the index.dat file (you might want to save the contents of the History folder) Empty the Recycle Bin Update and run the latest core version of Adaware SE Personal Edition (currently version 1.05). Once the scan is complete, click on an object found, right-click a lined item and select all, click next and remove all. Update and run the latest version of Spybot (currently version 1.3.) Before running the scan, run immunize. Then run Look for Problems. Once problems are found, select them all and click on Fix Problems. Note: Some spyware may be associated with programs you want to use, so read the help section for a further understanding of the features and options on both of these programs. These spyware objects detector utilities can be downloaded from download.com or majorgeeks.com. There is a third utility, called a hijack remover. There are many available, but I like CWShredder.exe (current version 2.00) (use http://www.google.com to find the program) Just make certain you are not online and that your browser is not open when you run it. You may be surprised and pleased if it finds something and fixes it (generally really bad stuff). Now you should be able to update and run your antivirus more successfully than ever before. The only catch is that it takes time. Once you figure out about how much time each step takes, you can determine whether you can walk away and come back later when it is done. I recommend running HouseKeeping at the end of every day you go online - if you can manage it. (cough! cough!) Otherwise, run it every 3 days for certain. Now, if you know your computer is clean and pure, then this is the only condition to justify running the defragmentation utility (once a week or twice a month). Defrag does not "fix" anything. It enhances the performance of a healthy environment. If you attempt to defrag a "sick" system, you could make it worse to the extent that the computer will fail to boot or run. If you have Windows 2000 or Windows XP, you can run defrag directly. If you have Windows Me, 98, or 95, run it in Safe Mode. I prefer running Defrag in Safe Mode as I have a UPS and the computer can complete the defrag, even if the lights go out in the house. Now that you have successfully learned the housekeeping routine and understand its importance without the need for complex and sometimes dangerous free software utilities that can cause conflicts, you can set up the program scheduler to run your housekeeping routine for you and just check up on it from time to time to see that it is accomplishing your wishes. Feel free to email me for further details and other fine, free utilities available for keeping your hard drive and system performing at its best. Dennis Schulman, known as the PC Miracle Man, has been a practicing field consultant in Largo, Florida for over 22 years. He has been a member of the Tampa Bay Computer Society for over 15 years and was the editor of its sometimes 40-page newsletter for 5 years. He can be contacted at dschulman@myrapidsys.com. by Nowshade Kabir If you use emails actively in your communication, you must have received various messages claiming to be from Ebay, Paypal and a number of banks. A recent email as if from U.S. Bank Corporation that I received contains the subject "U.S. Bank Fraud Verification Process" and in the body of the mail it says "We recently reviewed your account, and suspect that your U.S. Bank Internet Banking account may have been accessed by an unauthorized third party. Protecting the security of your account and of the U.S. Bank network is our primary concern. Therefore, as a preventative measure, we have temporarily limited access to sensitive account features. To restore your account access, please take the following steps to ensure that your account has not been compromised:". It continues with a link to a webpage, which looks very similar to original web page of the bank. The misleading web site appears authentic with familiar graphics and logos. The wordings are professional right down to the legal disclaimer at the bottom of the page. If you happened to be holding an account of the claimed bank, followed the instructions of the email and input your account, pin, password, etc. you are doomed. You just have handed over access to your account to a con artist, who, in a matter of days, will drain off all the money available in that account. This new scam, which is proliferating in a very rapid pace, is called "Phishing". Phishing is a form of identity theft, where a con artist with the help of official looking email containing link to phony web pages capable of harvesting information, tricks an unsuspecting victim into divulging sensitive personal data. Scammers use these data to bilk victims out of their savings. One of the most common phishing campaigns being waged has targeted users of Web auction giant eBay and its PayPal division with financial services giant Citibank serving as another popular target. However, recently, every major bank has been hit with this scam. Crooks send out huge amounts of emails with an expectation that some of these email address owners may have online access to their accounts at the bank. The term "Phishing" is a deviation of the word "Fishing". In hackers' lexicon, in many words, "F" becomes "Ph". The term derives from the fact that scammers use sophisticated bait as they "fish" for users' personal information. According to Gartner, a research firm, illegal access to checking accounts gained via phishing has become into the fastest growing type of consumer theft in the United States. Roughly 1.98 million people reported that their checking account was breached in one way or another during the last year and US$ 2.4 billion were defrauded from the victims! Gartner also estimated that 57 million U.S. Internet users have received phishing emails and 3 percent of them may have fooled into revealing their personal sensitive information. The Anti-Phishing Working Group has also spotted a dramatic increase in reports of phishing attacks in recent months. Since November, 2003 phishing scams increase by about 110 percent each month. In April alone, the group identified 1125 unique phishing scams, a sharp lift of 178 percent from the previous month. MessageLabs, a company that watches phishing scams closely, has noted an even more dramatic increase in number of phishing emails. It claims to see phishing messages jump from just 279 in September, 2003 to a staggering 215,643 in March of 2004. The scammers also started to use more sophisticated technologies in recent months. The latest generation of phishing scammers uses several methods to trick users, including pop-up graphics to mast the true web URL of the phishing site and the installation of Spywares and Trojans on victim's computer. The perpetrators also take advantage of security bugs in web browsers, in which the URL in the address bar appears to be for one site but is, in fact, a link to a totally different site. A new Windows worm under the name "Korgo" is able to infiltrate into victim's system with a key logging Trojan, steal information that the victim input in web forms and secretly transmit to designated server. There are a number of variants of this worm and they are spreading rapidly. However, Microsoft in April came up with a patch to seal this glitch. Many computers without the patch are still vulnerable to this potentially dangerous worm. A U.S. Treasury report provides consumers with steps to prevent and report phishing scams: Do not respond to or open any e-mail that warns that an account is about to be closed. Contact the company directly by phone and inquire of this e-mail. Do not submit financial information unless there is a symbol for a locked padlock on the browser's status bar. Also look for the https:// at the beginning of the Web address. If both of these signs are absent, the Web site is not secure. Always review your bank statement and credit card statements immediately upon receipt. Verify the domestic telephone number listed on the Web site through directory assistance or other reliable sources and call the number. Many phishing attacks have originated outside the U.S. and don't have a domestic number. Report suspicious activity or if you have been defrauded to the FTC and the FBI. Phishing e-mails can be forwarded to uce@ftc.gov. Complaints can be filed at http://www.ftc.gov. Phishing attacks can also be reported to the Internet Fraud Complaint Center at http://www.ifccfbi.gov. Other cautionary measures you should take in order to protect yourself are: Since most of the phishing emails come through spam, get a spam filter and install on your computer. If you suspect a phishing attempt, report immediately to the bank. Every bank web site has a link or a toll-free number to report scams. Don't be ashamed if you were tricked into divulging account information. If you report it immediately, your account will be protected until you receive a new PIN. Change your password and PINs regularly. Banks advise that you use separate PINs and passwords for different accounts, that way if one gets compromised, your entire financial life won't be revealed. If you are a frequent user of EBay, download its Web browser toolbar, a small program that runs with a user's Web browser. It flashes red when the user visits a possible spoof site. The toolbar uses a database of spoof site URLs, submitted by customers and is updated quite often. Check your computer frequently for possible Trojan virus. About the author: Nowshade Kabir is the founder, primary developer and present CEO of Rusbiz.com. A Ph. D. in Information Technology, he has wide experience in Business Consulting, International Trade and Web Marketing. by Jay Munro How many times have you sent a long URL to a friend only to have it break when it's put in his e-mail client? It's not rocket science to cut and paste the portions of the link into a browser, but many nonexpert users just don't get it. So how do you make that long catalog link easy for your mom? A URL-redirector service does the job. A redirector service takes a long URL, stores it in a database, and returns it as a short address. When the short address is used, the service redirects the user to the page the long address points to. The link is usually a short domain, such as TinyURL or SnipURL, followed by a unique identifier. Some services, such as MakeAShorterLink, URLCut, and TinyURL, assign a random identifier, while others, like MetaMark Shorten and ek.dk, let you choose a word or code. In a few cases, such as with MakeAShorterLink, you may actually have a longer name for the link, but the service may confer other benefits, such as tracking clicks. Several services can automatically copy the created URL to the clipboard for Internet Explorer users. IE allows this by default. Though this is convenient, it is a security risk, since it works both ways: A malicious site can try to read your clipboard. We prefer to set IE to prompt us when this happens. In IE, click on Tools | Internet Options, then select the Security tab and click on the Custom Level button. Scroll down to the Scripting section and click on Prompt under the "Allow Paste Operations via Script" selection. Longevity can be another problem. The services we looked at were free and, as such, may last only as long as the owner feels altruistic. If the link is something you won't care about for very long, don't worry. But none of the sites guarantee they'll be there forever, which can be a problem if you plan to use the link in a blog or mailing list that's likely to be archived. What you can do in this case is make both the short link and the long one available. And many sites make the source code readily available, so a developer or company that wants better guarantees could set up their own service. You need to watch out for your privacy as well. Some of the sites, such as qURL.net and URLCut, display popular links or the last ones loaded. SnipURL even puts the sites it does links for into categories such as "weird," "irritating," or "funny." This lets anyone visiting the site see the links you've entered. URLCut and several others let you set passwords to keep URLs private. The services available range from simple to feature-packed. MakeAShorterLink offers a basic short URL with a random identifier, while EK.DK lets you pick your own names. Most of the sites are based on similar code, which is available through the CPAN Perl code-search site. Most offer APIs (usually in Perl) for Web site developers and bookmarklets for average users. (Bookmarklets are snippets of JavaScript code. See http://go.pcmag.com/bookmarklets for more information.) We looked at 11 sites (see table), and since they're all free, it's worth trying them all. A couple, however, had either interesting features or a better interface. SnipURL has one of the slicker interfaces. Registering (free) gets you the MySnipURL control panel where you can view, test, edit, share, e-mail, or delete all your snipped URLs. You can also see click statistics for the various URLs. Unlike some of the simpler services, SnipURL has a search feature, which is especially useful if you've got a lot of stored clips. NotLong.com offers shorter URLs with statistics, as well as custom or random names. Unlike with SnipURL, you need a password to check statistics. NotLong tracks total clicks, unique browsers, and unique IP addresses for each link, though you can only view one URL's stats at a time. The site also offers a table of links to other redirection sites and a pretty good comparison chart. Shorl is a simple site with an interesting twist. It tags short URLs with random IDs that are created from a phonetic language that represents the numbers from 0 to 127, or in binary, 7 bits (0 to 1111111). The language is called Koremutake, and uses two- or three-character syllables such as "BO" (3) or "TRE" (127). The syllables were selected to be easy to remember. The short URLs look like this: http://shorl.com/hydrydestefuda (the Internet Movie Database listing for The Stepford Wives, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0327162 ). Shorl assigns a password (also in Koremutake) that, when combined with the link name will display the statistics. In all, a short-URL service can be quite handy. Short URLs also can be used to hide the true link (at least before the user clicks on it). In addition, the tracking feature on several of the sites can be useful, even if you don't need to shorten a link. Karen Kenworthy, one of freeware's veteran contributors, hits a home run with Replicator, a dead simple way to automate backups. You choose your source files or folder, point to a destination (including networked drives), set the timer, and the program makes backups at regular intervals. A tagging function lets you append various time-stamp labels to each backup for easier identification later. Karen has taken away our last excuse for not making backups: We forgot. (Freeware) - http://www.karenware.com from "Off The Beaten Path," Computer Power User magazine, October 2004 Vol.4 Issue 10 http://www.computerpoweruser.com FOR SALE: Viewsonic 17GA 17" monitor with speakers in bezel. Must see/hear this monitor to appreciate how wonderful it is. $100 or best offer. Paul, 484-7680 FOR SALE: Gateway 800C Desktop w/Monitor, 20GB Hard Drive plus Epson Stylus Color 777 printer. Less than one year old. Only $600 complete. Contact Frances in Fort Collins at (970) 224-0776. About Trading Post k-Byte runs classified ads in Trading Post for three consecutive issues. Trading Post ads up to 10 lines (or 70 words) long are free to FRPCUG members: $5 for non-members. To place an ad in Trading Post contact Rick Mattingly at 970-613-8968 or email rmatt@jymis.com. Commercial Advertising Specifications (Monthly rate) Full Page (8 1/2" X 7") $30 Half Page (3 1/4" X 7") $20 One Third Page (3" X 4") $15 Business Card (2 3/4" X 1 1/2") $ 5 We offer a substantial discount for repeat ads and continuing contracts. For additional charge, we will design your ad for you. Contact Rick Mattingly for information on this service at 970-613-8968 or email rmatt@jymis.com. |
