Twas the night before Christmas

Twas the night before Christmas when all through the house,
lights flashed on the tower and even the mouse.
The Webcams were ready, installed with great care.
In hopes that grandkids would be virtually there.

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of computer games danced in their heads;
Mamma in her rocker, a netbook on her lap.
To check Santa’s route on Norads’ tracking map.

Last minute shopping, I knew it would matter,
Receipts from the printer were spit with a clatter.
The e-mail program began to beep and flash,
Away to the desktop I flew in a dash,
An e-mail from Santa, I pulled from the cache.

The sleigh was loaded, the springs sitting low
Boxes of computer games, only kids know.
Dead Space II for Tommy, Pokemon for Sue,
Xbox, Wii, Playstation and Nintendo too.

Neither Mamma nor I had Santa forgot,
A wireless keyboard and mouse in the lot.
From a webcam mounted some far away place
An image so small, across the screen it did race.
What could it be I wondered, what would appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer,
With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.

I toggled the volume and turned it up loud
As his digital facade flew over the clouds
At the speed of Moore’s law his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;
"Now, Dell! Now, Gates! Now, Jobs and Wosniak!
On, Bezos! On Ellison! On, Hewlett and Packard!

To the top of the toolbar! The top of the screen!
Now pixels are changing, amazed by it all!
The picture expanded as closer he drew
His exact location surely only he knew.
But Google Street view offered a hopeful clue.
Just a click of the mouse, our house was in view.

With the sleigh full of downloads, upgrades and such
St. Nicholas too, might it be just too much?
The broadband was humming the router secure
A shiny new computer I’m sure will allure
Firewalls open for the jolly red elf.
Presents are coming, surely some for myself.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
A mystery for sure I pondered aloud.
Could Santa be real an answer I vowed.
An Internet search for the jolly St. Nick
“Santa Claus: could he be real” should turn the trick

Pages and pages of results did appear
To read them all might take ‘til Christmas next year.
My eyelids grew heavy then started to droop,
A short nap was needed so I could regroup.

Foggy and confused from my slumber I stirred,
“You’ve got mail,” from the speakers I heard.
An e-mail from Santa’s own smartphone it said,
A tight schedule barred his waking me he pled.
Presents for all under the tree he had spread.
Click here for a live video feed of the sled.

The digital image danced and sparkled bright.
Santa driving his sleigh on its magical flight.
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
"Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good-night."

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Santa endorsed! See his comments Here.

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

All I Want for Christmas is to File My Income Tax for FREE!

W. Edwards Deming said, “There must be consistency in direction.” If there is one thing about Charlotte County, it is consistency. Certain things that happen every year, year after year. We have the Florida Air Show in Punta Gorda each year. We look forward to the Punta Gorda Block Party this April just as we did in years past. We have the Red Fish Tournament, Gallery Walks, car shows, etc; each year just like clockwork. It makes us feel safe, knowing the future. Some of these events have been around for a while, some are fairly new, but their consistency has been established.

Did you know that there has been one event that has occurred every year since 1916? This one event has been attended by almost every single person without exception. In fact we have so dutifully taken part in this event that we don’t even think about it until it is upon us. Have you figured out what it is? Here’s a hint, it takes place April 15^th this year. Give up? It is the filing of your Federal Income Tax forms with our friends at the IRS.

How are we going to file our taxes this year? Some of us will spend a few days collecting all our receipts, property tax records, charity contributions, W2’s, 1099’s, turn them over to our beloved CPA, and hope that our forms go to the top of the file. We pray that the CPA uses his/her magic to save us as much money as possible without our spending time in the BIG HOUSE.

Others of us will go to the local office store and buy one of the popular tax reporting software packages. We then will spend some more time answering the interrogatory that walks us through all the forms and calculates the total good or bad news. Some of us need the super deluxe packages with the forms required to report how many times we blew our nose this year. But many of us simply need a 1040, 1040a or 1040ez. For these people, the cost of the software package or the CPA is more than the tax we owe or expect back. What’s an enthusiastic tax payer to do?

Our computer might be able to help. There are a number of companies that offer either online or downloadable tax software for FREE. (Martha, how much of a deduction for free?) The best place to start when investigating this possibility is (queue the scary music) http://www.irs.gov/uac/Free-File:-Do-Your-Federal-Taxes-for-Free. Once there, click on the links that help us determine our eligibility. Let Free File do the hard work for you with brand-name software or online Fillable Forms. You can prepare and e-file your federal return for free. The IRS claims “The Free File program is a free federal tax preparation and electronic filing program for eligible taxpayers developed through a partnership between the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the Free File Alliance LLC, a group of private sector tax software companies. Since Free File’s debut in 2003, more than 15.4 million returns have been prepared and e-filed through the program. Free File allows taxpayers with an Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) of $57,000 or less in 2012 to e-file their federal tax returns for free.  That means 70 percent of all taxpayers – 95 million taxpayers – can take advantage of the Free File program.”

Read the information presented on the WEB page there and then either choose a company listed or, if unsure of which company offers the preparation you need, click on the Guide Me to a Company button and let the computer point you in the right direction. In my case the site listed five companies that would prepare my taxes for free and let me E-file and print my return for FREE. Caution: These companies obviously don’t do this out of the goodness of their hearts, and they offer many “Value Added” components (for a price) which you may or may not need.

Is it secure? The site I picked displayed the gold padlock in my browser frame indicating that the information being transmitted was encrypted with a 128 character cipher key. This means that an unscrupulous person would need to guess a 128 character “password” in order to see your data. You allow your CPA to see it without a password, so just use common sense, close other windows, make sure the firewall is turned on and an Anti-Virus program is running.

Merry Christmas and have a great April!

PS: Looking for that something different for Christmas? Something that says “I put some thought into this rather than picking up another necktie.” Then get that special someone one or both of my books for a joyous holiday gift. One will help them with their computer issues and the other will let them pat their tummy and say “Ah, that was good!”

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

Show Me the Money!

Money, Money. It happened again this week. I woke up from a wild dream that I was the CEO of a major car company and Daffy Duck just walked in and handed me 17 billion dollars. Not only that, but I don’t even have to explain what I plan to do with it. The week before I dreamed I was a bank CEO and Bugs Bunny hopped into my office and dropped off a giant sack of cash and yelled, “have fun and let me know if you need more,” as he left. An unexpected windfall, or as it is sometimes referred to, found money is always a pleasant surprise. Remember the last time you reached in a pants pocket and pulled out a five spot? It brought a smile to your face.

Think back over the years. Were there insurance policies that faded from memory? Stocks or bonds that got misplaced. Water or utility deposits never collected when our residence changed? Bank accounts and safe deposit box contents left behind? Maybe even some un-cashed checks and wages? Have you considered that our erudite electronic savant may lead us to found money? Is it possible that our digitally demonstrative servant might offer us a way to prospect for treasures unknown? Is it possible some cold hard cash is only a few keystrokes away?

Money, Money. Hundreds of companies claim they will find, for a small fee, lots of money lying around just waiting for us to claim it. However, our government requires lost assets to be turned over to the states. All but nine of the states and even a few Canadian provinces have joined together to facilitate reuniting lost assets with their owners. To augment the states' ability to locate lost property owners, MissingMoney.com, a national database, was established in November 1999 and is the only database endorsed by the National Association of Unclaimed Property Administrators (NAUPA). MissingMoney.com enables owners to perform comprehensive searches for lost assets.

X marks the spot. Let’s start this treasure hunt with a trip to missingmoney.com. There we will learn that this site is a jumping off place for a search in any state we live or lived in. The database maintained by NAUPA is updated monthly and the searches we perform are, hold on to your hats, FREE. (Free cash for FREE, Martha) Start your search by entering your name. Remember, less is more. If you put in John Q. Public then the search will be for exactly that. But maybe your lost assets were made out to J. Q. Public. That will not show up unless you type it exactly that way. So start with just Public. Now every lost asset for any first name, initial or middle name Public will turn up in the results.

If your name appears with a lost asset it will display the name of the state holding the asset and the company or agency that reported the asset to the state. Click on your name, and it will take you to the state website where the real work begins. Every state has a form to fill out and you must be able to prove you are the person the asset belongs to. Dealing with the states in general can take months nevertheless the outcome may well be worth it. One person I talked to about their experience indicated it took almost nine months to work through the red tape, provide the documentation required and then just waiting for the wheels of government to turn. But, they got a check for twelve hundred dollars from some assets lost in the late 1950’s. Another friend reported that he received $400 representing a forgotten utility deposit.

Searching for hidden assets is fun too. (Unless there isn’t anything for me.) Still after spending some time searching for yourself, you will be tempted to plug in the name of your brother or sister, mom, dad, acquaintances and so on. My son is on his grandmothers favorite grandson list now because he happened to find her name on the list. He emailed her and she got a little cash out of it. Tell your family and friends about this site. Somebody’s experts, estimate 1 in every 8 people in the U.S. have missing money.

Money, Money. Maybe dreams can come true.

More helpful hints and ideas can be found in Grumbles From The Keyboard. And, if you like to eat while reading check out Epicuria: Adventures that really Cook!

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

It’s Christmas Time in the City!

Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Christmas cards must go, oh what fun it is to address each and every one, OH. Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, there’s got to be a way, to address all those cards and mail them on their way.

It’s that time again. Time to find the Christmas cards, sign them, stuff them in the envelopes and put the address and stamp on each and every one. What’s that? You’re sending electronic email Christmas cards this year? Emily Post says, “…Your great aunt Sara, who cherishes your handwritten notes, may still prefer a traditional card. Others, too, might rather have a traditional paper greeting.” Personally, I prefer a traditional Christmas card. Something I can set on the buffet table, pick up and know that this person considered me important enough choose or make a card, write a short note or simply sign, place in an envelope and spend fourty five cents to send a three dimensional greeting. There is something elegant and sophisticated about traditional social graces. An email card makes me one of untold many in your email address book, superficial and one dimensional.

However, personal graciousness and stylish behavior doesn’t have to be tedious and overwhelming. We can turn to our trusty computer companion to help us complete this task of a time honored ritual. One of the ways we can shorten our time devoted to our family and friends is to use software to prepare mailing labels or for more sophisticated users we can use a mail merge. (Martha, we could leave your sister off the list.) Let’s take a look at some tools that might help us complete our tasks and once done, give us a leg up on next year.

First, we can look at address labels. Many stores carry precut labels in standard sizes for envelopes that come on 8 ½ by 11 inch sheets for your printer. They will have a number that will tell your computer what type of size and format is needed to use these labels. For example the most common address label seems to be Avery 5160. Many other brands will tell you on the packaging that they are equivalent to Avery such and such. Decide which size is needed and purchase them.

Many PCs are shipped with MS Works installed as a basic office suite containing a word processor, database, spreadsheet etc. If you have this on your PC, the MS Works Task Launcher has a very simple wizard that will walk you through creating a page of labels that fit the labels you purchased. Here again, there are two choices. We can simply tell the wizard to create a page of blank labels and then we can type in the names and addresses in each label. When completed, save it to the computer and then next year we can simply pull up this file, make whatever changes are needed and print another set of labels.

We can also use the wizard to make the labels but instead of typing in all the names and addresses, we can tell it to pull the names and addresses from our address book or a database file of names and addresses. This is called a mail merge. Once this is done we can save this as well and next year simply pull up the file and print the labels again. This does require that we keep our address book up to date. Other programs such as WordPerfect have a similar function and can also be used to create labels.

If you have MS Word on your computer then you can also go to http://office.microsoft.com/ and click on Templates and then search for Christmas Labels. There is an entire collection of labels there that fit most of the common size Avery labels. Simply download the template and create some festive labels.

What’s that? You don’t have any of these programs on the PC? Go to www.avery.com, click on the software tab and download Avery Design and Print Online. (FREE) This program can create many different labels, supplying a template for different pictures, borders etc for your label. It’s web based so almost any PC can use it.

Finally, for those of us that torment our friends and relatives with a nefarious Christmas letter, using the mail merge feature will allow us to write a Christmas letter, but merge the letter with an address book. This allows the author to write one letter, but each time it prints it pulls a different name from the address book. I did this one year and while each letter was the same, it would start out with Dear “first name” and then as the letter progressed; each family would find that I mentioned them by name while referring to some interesting tidbit. It appeared to each reader that I had typed a letter exclusively to the recipient.

Keep those cards and letters going, there’s only thirty days till Christmas.

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Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

How did they Hack Uncle Joe’s email?

My mother used to say, “How many times do I have to tell you?” George Santayanna mused, “Those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it." We’ve talked about it before but events the last couple of weeks would seem to inspire a repeat. The word for the week is passwords. Why do we use passwords? Passwords are used to prevent unauthorized people from accessing data that could be used to harm us. Either financially or our reputations.

Consider this report by the Guardian, 61% of us use the same password for all of our secured accounts. Banks, brokerages, email accounts, music buying accounts etc. One password gives an intruder full rein over our lives. With that said, don’t feel that it is necessary to live in a constant state of fear. The Internet’s benefits far outweigh the drawbacks, especially when they can be mitigated by using a little common sense.

Here’s another little known fact. According to PCmagazine, the top ten passwords in the world are, password, 123456, qwerty, abc123, letmein, monkey, myspace1, password1, link182, (your first name). If your password is on that list it needs to be changed now. Hackers will look at your email address; this tells them what domain you belong to. For example, if your email is 123@aol.com then they know that you have an account at AOL and if they go to the AOL home page and type in your email in the sign in field, they are confident that a very high percentage of the time, one of the above passwords will get them into your account. Once in they can, as they did to a friend of mine, notify everyone in the address book that you are in desperate need of money and please send some to an address in Nigeria by wire transfer. Or they can send an email that touts some bogus website that supposedly you visited and were simply wowed.

Facebook and Linkedin are great social networking sites that allow us to keep our friends and family up to speed on our comings and going. But if someone guesses our password and accesses our social network site, all kinds of things, good, bad, true or not can be posted by someone with an agenda. Worse yet, if that nefarious character changes our password to a tough password that we can’t guess, it will take an extraordinary effort to even close the account much less wrestle it back to our control.

It’s probably not critical that we have strong passwords for low level accounts. Certain blogs or sites where we function under an avatar or screen name or sites like online newspapers where a breach would not bankrupt us, but when it comes to banks, insurance and bill paying sites STRONG needs to be our mantra. What makes up a strong password? First forget about dictionary words. Hackers have software programs that can try every word in the dictionary in a matter of minutes. Children’s names, birth dates, anniversary dates etc can all be tried in seconds. Here are some simple tips. Longer is better, random sequences, characters and numbers mixed in with some symbols like # or ^, increase the difficulty of cracking a password by magnitudes of order.

What’s your favorite phrase? Take out the spaces, leave out a word, throw in a few misspellings and the makings of a great password arise. Remember, just because a site says to create a password with a minimum of six characters, doesn’t mean that we have to stop at six. Try using our weight followed by a # sign and followed up with a misspelled word that means something to us like misteak. (Martha, that reminds me of dinner.)

According to Microsoft, it's not necessarily bad to write passwords down - a piece of paper is going to be much harder to hack for an internet crook than something stored on your computer or online, as long as it is adequately protected. Hide it, disguise it, put spaces in it and blend it in with other things. And don't write "My banking passwords" at the top of the page.

Not sure how secure your password is? Surf over to www.microsoft.com/protect/fraud/passwords/checker.aspx where Microsoft provides an online password checker. Type in a password you use or are thinking of using and a progress bar appears to indicate the strength of the password. Try some of yours, you might be surprised.

Be safe out there.

Cure Constipation, put a copy of Grumbles From the Keyboard beside the commode for the morning constitutional!

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Want to cause constipation? Try the recipes in Epicuria: Adventures that Really Cook!

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

Dave–Are You There? Trick or Treat!

My client listened intently as I outlined, described and demonstrated the method that would allow his computer to achieve the result desired. Head nodding, eyes wide and feet fidgeting told me that despite my brilliant colloquium, anguish and fear still lurked. What, I wondered had happened to cause such torment? Was there something deeper, darker, and even sinister that spread its fiendish witchery from the processors and chips inside the box to the world outside? I pondered how to break down the dungeon walls so that my client could meld with the machine.

As I stood there, I rested my hand on the tower, only to feel the cemetery chill of the metal. For no reason at all, a phantasm of Pandora’s Box formed in my mind’s eye, unleashing all the horrors of the world. But no, surely this computer was benevolent. There has never been a computer that turned on its owners, has there? No sooner had I framed the question and HAL from the movie 2001 A Space Odyssey. The HAL9000 destroyed the crew of the spaceship and hijacked the mission. I assured myself that it was just a movie. Rarely does science fiction become reality. Or does it?

But my goal was to make client and computer partners if not friends. I needed to deflect any unreasonable fears he may have. “The computer is a tool, at our command,” I said. Of course the movie Colossus starred a computer that took over the world by seizing control of all the worlds’ nuclear weapons and threatening to launch them if it was disobeyed. But again, futuristic imagination doesn’t necessarily mean a future reality does it?

Our psyches were formed by stories of inhuman experiments that created hybrid humans, endowed with horrible yearnings and ideas. But we needn’t fear our computers. They have barely evolved. Sure, fifteen years ago they were glorified adding machines. Today, these Frankenstein machines boast of using fuzzy logic to understand their human’s desires. I had a teacher once that spoke of my fuzzy logic and it wasn’t a good thing. If it takes only fuzzy logic for them to understand us, how can we understand their pure and precise logic? (Martha, how do you spell paranoia?)

John F. Kennedy said, “I am sorry to say that there is too much point to the wisecrack that life is extinct on other planets because their scientists were more advanced than ours.“ Now the hair on my neck is starting to stand. Is it possible computers could take over the world? No, wait we can always pull the plug. But what if they are solar or nuclear powered with power storage backups. What if we can’t pull the plug? Or can’t pull it in time? Hold on, let’s get a grip.

I think that I may be letting my imagination get away from me. Let’s think this through. For computers to take over and control humans, it would imply that machines had evolved a purpose. A purpose! Most of us couldn’t define our own purpose. How is a machine going to gain a purpose? I feel much better now. I finish my appointment and head home. Sticking the key in the lock I open the door and there is my robotic vacuum cleaner PURPOSEFULLY moving around the room, learning where the furniture, steps and doors are and the perimeter of the room. It moves methodically, vacuuming every inch of the floor until it is done and then announces that the job is complete.

Is it such a leap from a horseshoe crab looking robot vacuum cleaner to some higher form? Look at the recent contest sponsored by the military where vehicles, cars, trucks even a GM Hummer, had to maneuver hundreds of miles over a variety of terrains and do it with NO human guidance. Last year no machine made the finish, this year seven made it. Even when their GPS guidance systems were blocked these machines were able to figure out where they were and were they had to go. (Martha, they did not stop for directions.) And from these thinking, self guiding vehicles to robots with humanoid forms, is it truly such a large leap? The movie Westworld depicts an entire theme park where no one can tell the difference between the robots and the humans. Did I say no one? The robots knew the difference and used that knowledge to wipe out the humans.

Excuse me a moment, my computer is calling me and telling me I have some things that must be done right now….or else.

Happy Halloween.

By the way, reports continue to pour in that Grumbles from the Keyboard may, in addition to helping us understand our computers and the Internet, relieve constipation. Many readers have told me that they keep a copy of Grumbles right beside the commode and read at least a chapter a day. Try it, it may brighten your day.

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

After all that reading, there may be a feeling of hunger. If that is the case, try Epicuria, Adventures that Really Cook!, It’s not your mothers cookbook. In fact, it combines story telling with some good home cooking so it may be in a genre by itself.

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

Things to do on a Rainy Day

Rain, we need it, but it does put a damper on some of our favorite activities, at least the outdoor ones. What is a person to do on a sodden day? Well, since this is a computer column, let’s see if there isn’t some fun and exciting things to do on or with our computer. Here is a list of stuff to do on a rainy day.

First and foremost, backup files, pictures or anything else you don’t want to lose. I know, boring! But think of three of your neighbors last week that called me with computers that would not run. Only one had backups of all their files and after a new hard drive was installed we were able to move the back upped files to the new drive and they were up and running. No fuss, no muss. But, the other two, no backups. Fortunately, or not, I have some equipment and software that allows me to attempt to recover information from a non functional drive. On one of these hard drives, my software spent twenty-nine hours snatching files until the hard drive finally stopped permanently. I probably recovered sixty- five percent of their data. The other drive, I was able to get virtually all of the files they needed. So, while it is raining, stick in a flash drive or a CDrom or go to drive.google.com for five gigabits of free online storage, or Skydrive for seven gigs to store documents and spreadsheets online also for FREE and back up the important stuff.

How many folks are still using Microsoft’s Outlook Express to get their emails? Outlook Express or OE replaced Internet Mail and News in 1997 with the release of Internet Explorer 4. Over the last eighteen years it has seen few external changes even while many behind the scenes changes regarding security issues and filter capabilities were added. Outlook Express was a very important tool for computer users back when we paid for Internet time by the minute. (Don’t even remember that it was so long ago.) We would open OE, it would immediately dial out, grab our emails and then hang up. We could then read the emails at our leisure, reply to them, create new messages, all without paying for online time. When we were ready, we would hit the send and receive button, OE would dial out and send our messages, grab any new messages and hang up again. Outlook Express disappeared from Windows Operating Systems with the introduction of Vista which brought us Windows Mail.

But today, with only five people still paying for Internet time by the minute, and only seven more still using a dial up connection to the Internet, Microsoft has raised the ante with the introduction of Windows Live Mail. Windows Live Mail is now bundled with the Windows 7 operating system so those with new computers are already using Windows Live Mail.

Email, for most people is the primary function for which the computer is used. As we receive more and more emails pertaining to everything from jokes, purchase receipts, to personal letters, the risks from bogus emails and the effort needed to manage and organize our email becomes ever more onerous. Windows Live Mail was designed to address these issues and some issues that are more commercially oriented. With thousands of messages in your inbox, trying to find that one e-mail message you want can be a challenge. This is especially true for saved e-mail, which might be months or years old. Windows Live Mail includes a built-in Instant Search field. Type in a keyword and Instant Search will find and list all the emails that match the keyword.

Windows Live Mail also includes a built-in Junk Mail Filter that automatically screens e-mail to identify and separate out junk e-mail. In the past the user needed to train the filters to identify junk mail before it would block the junk emails. Windows Live Mail uses preconfigured filters that are continually updated via Windows updates and starts catching junk emails from the first time we use it.

Appearance of the new mail program is web like. Very modern and high tech looking which makes Outlook Express look antiquated. Windows Live Mail is one of the programs bundled into Windows Live Essentials. To download and install a copy of Windows Live Mail, or any of the other programs available in that suite, go to http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-live/essentials-other-programs. Your computer must be running Windows XP-SP3, Vista and if you have Windows 7 there is an excellent probability that Windows Live Mail and other pieces of the suite are already installed.

I think the rain has stopped.

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

In 1964 They Promised Me a Video Phone

“Peek-a-boo I see you.” “Grandma, look at me!” The sounds of Christmas we enjoy as much as the songs and sleigh bells. Watching wrapping paper fly, and new toys sliding along the floor entertains us for hours. But what if we can’t make that trip to the children this year? How about their birthdays? Wouldn’t it be nice to participate in the party even if we can’t be there in person? It would be extra special to see a child’s first steps or the first words spoken.

Families are scattered all over the country now and sometimes, scheduling, cost or physical limitations make impossible for us to physically attend these special events. Some of us even have to work and that really interferes with our free time. Maybe our computers can offer a solution for the next best thing to being there.

A few years ago, Webcams were just starting to appear and were priced in the stratosphere. Today they are easily within the reach of almost everyone or even built in to almost every laptop, cell phone and tablet. Additionally, for those bordering on technological befuddlement, the installation and set up is almost automatic. About the only thing we need to do is plug it in, maybe run a cdrom, (although even that is rapidly fading) and make sure we have a broadband Internet connection.

Webcams have truly come a long way. Businesses now use webcams for corporate communication; daycares use them to allow parents to keep an eye on their children; universities hold classes via webcam all over the world. Dog kennels allow remote viewing of the precious little barker. I even have a webcam in the garage so I can ask and show what I am trying to do to my friends who can then help me restore my truck. If there is something that you would like to monitor remotely, a Webcam makes it easy.

The key to using a webcam for communication is an instant messaging program. There are many IM programs available but usually both ends of a Webcam need to use the same program. I use Skype just because almost everyone has it, it is a Microsoft product and it is FREE (love that word, Martha) and is readily available to anyone running Windows or a Mac. However, there is AOL’s Instant Messenger (AIM), Yahoo Messenger, Logitech Messenger, Windows Messenger and many more. They all work well, but again to communicate both webcams, yours and the one at the grandkids house should be using the same program.

Let’s set up a webcam. First we need to purchase one. A quick run through the local big box store found webcams from $10 to $70. Of course if the kids don’t have one, you may need two. Price determines the features available on the camera. Example: The $10 unit has a picture resolution of 100 kilo pixel while the $25 unit has things like pixel resolution at 640 x 480 and frames per second at 30 FPS. Most webcams on the market can capture still photos in addition to video. Check a webcam’s snapshot resolution. Higher-end models can capture photos at many megapixels. Webcams often have built in microphones or a separate headset and microphone to help us experience a true video call and add our voice to a chat session. Many webcams offer some cool extra features such as a quick call button that will activate a call to a land line although calls to land lines cost extra while a video call from computer to computer is still FREE. Can’t sit still? Turn on face tracking. This is a feature that allows the webcam to automatically follow your face.

Next get an IM client. Unlike webcams, most of them are free. If you’re running Windows or Mac Skype works well: a lot of people use it, it’s compatible with nearly every webcam made, and it allows you to connect with friends who are using Messenger or Yahoo! Messenger. To install Skype, go to the website (Skype.com) and follow the instructions to create an account and download the latest version.

Once you’ve got Skype up and running, all you need is to sign into you Skype account and start chatting. Now connect the webcam to a computer via a USB slot. Most webcams requires a driver to run it. (The driver is typically included on the installation CD that comes with the webcam, or you can download a driver from the manufacturer's website.) Follow these steps to start your webcam. Open Skype, sign in with your username and password, click on the Tools menu and then click Audio and Video setup. Follow the prompts and if you see a video feed streaming from your webcam, you’re done with the onetime set up. Now you can communicate just like the video phones promised us at the 1964 Worlds Fair.

Now where is my flying car?

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

IE9 It’s better than creamed cheese.

John F. Kennedy said “Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.” How true this is. Change can be subtle and virtually unnoticed, such as when we age. We simply wake up one morning, look in the mirror and wonder who is staring back. Sometimes change hits us like a freight train. Hurricane Charley is a good example. In a matter of hours, Charlotte County and Punta Gorda made changes that probably would have taken decades by any other method. Stores we used to shop at were gone. Vacant lots sprang up like weeds in our yards. But even that began to change. New stores, new homes, new roofs all began to flower as though from a freshly tilled garden. In a few years, we will barely remember the way it used to be.

Many computer users have also noticed a change recently. Up till a few months ago, we would dutifully say yes whenever Microsoft notified us of an update that was available to download and install. For the most part the changes were behind the scenes, closing security flaws or patching some code that wasn’t quite right. One day an update is announced, we unquestionably download and install it. At the end of the installation we are prompted to restart our computer. Here comes the desktop, and we prepare to surf the Internet. Probably didn’t even notice that our big blue Internet Explorer icon has a gold band around it now that wasn’t there before. And then the window opens and WHAT! It’s changed. Where is everything? Where oh where is my old Internet Explorer 8? How could they do this to me?

Take a deep breath. Sit back in the chair for a moment. Close your eyes and picture the old Professional building in Punta Gorda, ugly but functional. Now picture the new Sunloft building, beautiful and even more functional. IE9 is just that. It looks slicker, it is organized better in presenting to the user the features they actually use and it has some pretty neat bells and whistles that didn’t exist before. And before you break down and cry, please remember that everything that was in the old IE8 is still available in IE9.

Let’s look at IE9 as it comes out of the box then we can try to personalize the way it works to fit our expectations.

The first thing we'll notice when we open Internet Explorer 9 is the simplified design. We can find most command bar functions, like Print or Zoom, when we click the Tools button , and our favorites and feeds appear in Favorites Center when we click the Favorites button .

Next, take a look in the upper right hand corner. There is no longer a small search box there. Type in something in the URL bar and the default search provider will search the web and bingo it takes us right to it. The nice thing is that we can control the default search engine. If we don’t do anything the default will be Microsoft’s Bing. If we prefer Yahoo or Google or any other of the myriad search engines just click on the little down arrow next to the search field and select “Change Search Defaults.” Now to un-clutter the window you can uninstall all the toolbars by Google, My Web Search, Yahoo etc., because it is now built into IE9. Another missing item in the standard install of IE9 is the button on the toolbar that allows us to call up our email program. To get it back just right click on an empty area near the top of the browser and from the menu put a check mark next to Command Bar. One of the toolbars I recommend is the Status Bar which appears at the bottom of the browser window. While we are there we can add the Menu Bar making our browser more IE8 like and why not add the Favorites Bar. (Martha, it sounds like a martini shop)

There are many other features that are new and very helpful. IE9 opens web pages in tabs. So to have multiple web pages open doesn’t require the opening of IE9 over and over, simply open a new tab and type the address in the URL address bar or click on one of our favorites and there it is without closing the previous tab. Because of multiple tabs a user may have more than one home page that will open up when we start the program. When I open IE9, my Yahoo page opens in one tab, my Hotmail opens in another and my website www.bitsandbytesonline.com in a third. There are many other neat features that I’ll cover in future columns.

I wonder what the future will bring when IE10 arrives shortly.

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

Fun–damentals or stuff that must be done!

Sometimes things just have to be done. Punta Gorda regularly sweeps the Gilchrest and Collier bridges free of debris, mows vacant lots, waters the plantings in the medians and orders the removal of derelict structures. Our computers also require occasional but necessary maintenance as well, if we want them to look and act the way we expect. Recently a client asked me what she could do to keep her computer running at peak efficiency. Let’s take a look at some of the normal and routine maintenance that we can do to affect that result.

Here is a list of some of the fundamental maintenance functions each computer owner can perform. Let’s start with Antivirus. I am still amazed at the number of folks that are using the antivirus program that came preinstalled with their computer when it was purchased. Most, if not all of those programs were thirty or sixty day trial programs. Let’s clarify how an antivirus program works. It can only protect us from the viruses it knows about current to the day it was loaded on the computer. That is why all computers come with some antivirus program preloaded. The program is not the valuable piece. Recently a client told me there was antivirus on the computer. When I looked to see if it was current, I noticed that it was the trial program that came with the computer in 1999. The subscription had never been renewed. This poor helpless computer had been vulnerable to over 2100000 new viruses written and released since 1999.

The antivirus program is a piece of software that resides on our computer. It is a static program. This means that at the end of the trial period the program doesn’t stop working but the UPDATES that tell the program what viruses are roaming around the Web and how to stop or remove them are no longer received from the company that owns the antivirus software. Why is this important? There are approximately 250 new viruses released into the world each month. To continue to receive the updates that will protect us from these new viruses the user needs to pay for the subscription that ensures continued downloads of the updates. If we open the control panel for the antivirus program on our computer, somewhere there will be a date showing the last update we received and the last date we can expect to receive updates. If the dates shown are expired then renew the subscription, buy a new antivirus program or if using an Internet Service Provider that provides an anti virus program as part of the subscription, download their security packages included at no additional charge with your Internet service.

Spyware is also a detriment to the normal functioning of our computers. Spyware is different from viruses and has probably become even more insidious with regard to its spread and effect on the functioning of our PCs. Most anti virus programs protect agains spyware or ransomware but if looking for a low cost option, download Microsoft Security Essentials. It is a very effective anti-virus/spyware program and it is FREE from Microsoft. (Martha, he said my magic word!)

Now, there are also some basic functions that we need to perform to make sure our computers run at maximum effectiveness. Let’s start with Defragmentation. As we install and uninstall programs, load files, pictures or delete the same, these files are spread all around the hard drive. This means that when we ask for these files to be displayed the computer has to look for the files all over the hard drive. Defragmentation takes all the pieces of files and moves them to a confined space on the hard drive. That way when we call for the files the computer has only to look in a small area on the hard drive for the file and the retrieval of the file takes less time, or to our perception, the computer is much faster. If using Windows XP, go to START – ALL PROGRAMS- ACCESSORIES – SYSTEM TOOLS- DISK DEFRAGMENTER. When the window opens one of the choices is Analyze. Click on the button and XP will tell you if a defragmentation is necessary. Defragmentation takes a considerable time so it might be prudent to run it when the computer will not be needed for a while. It is not required to be online when performing this function. Those of us that have made the leap to VISTA or Windows 7 will find that VISTA/Windows 7 has a regularly scheduled defrag of the hard drive and no action on our part is required.

Finally, don’t forget to clean up unnecessary files. This can be done in XP, Vista and Windows 7 by going to START – ALL PROGRAMS- ACCESSORIES – SYSTEM TOOLS – DISK CLEANUP. The window will show how much space can be freed up by removing unnecessary files. Go ahead and allow the removal of these files. And what ever you do, make sure to pick up a copy of Grumbles from the Keyboard for a boatload of helpful hints on keeping that beloved computer running top notch.

And I thought spring cleaning was over.

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

Occam’s Razor

“You make it seem so simple.” How often have we told a repairman that as we watch a malfunctioning device come back to life? Our car mechanic looks under the hood and immediately determines why the car won’t start. Even our lowly computer techs listen to us as we describe how our binary friend refuses to start and before our portrayal of the problem is complete the computer comes to life under their magical administrations.

How do they do that? Surely there are schools and training that come into play. In my case, I once worked for a major company that over ten years spent close to $40,000 to make sure that I could keep their computers, servers and employees operating at peak efficiency. There is the multitude of Tech forums and online magazines (e-zines) that give insight to common and obscure problems.

There is a principle attributed to the 14th-century English logician and Franciscan friar William of Ockham called Occam’s Razor. This is often paraphrased as "All other things being equal, the simplest solution is the best." How does this apply to what techs do when they miraculously resurrect our malfunctioning PC servants? Let’s follow along as a tech makes a house call. The problems are real; the names are changed to protect the innocent. (Martha, he’s talking about you.)

“Help, I can’t get my email and when I go to my home page it says the page cannot be displayed.” “I restarted my computer and it still won’t let me get my mail.” The tech walks into the room, eyes moving purposely over the computer, screen, wires, outlets, printers and other hardware. As his eyes scan the modem, he notices that the DSL light isn’t on (if using Embarq) or the Online or Cable light isn’t on the Comcast modem. He reaches down, pulls the power cable out of the modem, counts to ten and plugs it back in. In a few moments ALL the lights come on and he opens Outlook Express and the client is astounded as email comes pouring in. He opens Internet Explorer and the home page pops up ready to serve up our Internet requests. Occam’s Razor.

“I don’t know what is wrong. My laptop is frozen and I can’t shut it down. I pulled the power cord out, the screen goes black but as soon as I plug it back in, the screen takes me back to where I was. Does this mean I need a new computer?” The tech reaches around and pulls out the power cord. But he knows that on a laptop, the battery immediately takes over and keeps the computer running. He turns over the laptop, pops out the battery, waits a moment or two, reinstalls the battery, turns the laptop back over, plugs in the power cord and presses the on button. The laptop fires up and goes through the normal startup procedure waiting for the user’s commands. Occam’s Razor.

“The computer is dead. The monitor is on, the printer works, the lights on the modem are blinking but the computer won’t start.” Our fearless tech notices that the components are all plugged into a surge protector. First he verifies that the plug is firmly seated in the back of the PC. Next he pulls the plug out of the surge protector and plugs it into a different socket. Press the power button on the tower and the computer fires up, just a bad socket on the surge protector. Check for power. Occam’s Razor.

“My computer takes for ever to start and then runs so slow I can make a cup of coffee and come back before the computer is ready for me. I switched to high speed Internet and it didn’t make any difference. Do I need a new computer?” The tech knows that the high speed Internet connection only affects the speed from the Internet TO the computer. It has absolutely no effect on the speed of the computer. After explaining the relationship between the computer and the Internet connection, he then begins to take out the trash. The tech uninstalls every program on the computer that is not being used. It is amazing how many programs put themselves in the computer’s start up even if we don’t use them. Kodak Easyshare and MS Messenger just to name a couple. If you don’t use it, get rid of it. Now the computer won’t take forever to start up because it won’t have as many programs to start.

Occam’s Razor.

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer: Courtland Nederveld: 9781467985895: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks!: Court Nederveld: 9781456561734: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

Spam and eggs

Like most folks I have several email addresses that I use for a variety of reasons. The one at the bottom of the column is for business and I have another that is for friends and family. There is another that is used for communicating with other Ford Mustangs folks and clubs and so on.

Imagine my surprise this week when what should appear in not one, not two, but three of my email accounts, but an email with my very own invitation to sign up for Congressman Tim Mahoney's e-Newsletter. I do appreciate that Tim sought me out from among all the folks that he could have sent it to. He wants my input (Martha, you and the computer guy must be important.) and I will do my best to offer what ever advice Tim doesn’t want to hear.

Tim’s email did get me to thinking however. How did he get three of my email addressees? Tim also wrote in the email invitation “But I need your permission first!” I assume this means permission to send me email. Confusion sets in when I think about the fact that apparently he doesn’t need my permission to send me email if it is asking for permission to send me ….. never mind! Tim, I do appreciate the invite, I will accept because it will probably be a great source of column material in the future.

But how do folks like Tim find out our email addresses. Let’s look at some places our email addresses are available. Think about the FREE greeting cards we like to send for birthdays, anniversaries etc. To send them we must provide our own email address and the email address of the recipient. Now the company has two valid email addresses to include on an email list that can be sold to bulk email companies. Another place to get email addresses is to send out hundreds of computer generated emails about Viagra or hot stocks and the emails that do not get kicked back as having a bad email address go on the list and sold to the next bulk emailer. Don’t forget, even signing up for Amazon or any online store that requires an email address puts us in a position for the address to be sold or used by an “affiliate partner.”

How much spam is there? Statistics, extrapolations and counting by Radicati Group from April 2010 estimate the number of emails sent per day (in 2010) to be around 294 billion. 294 billion messages per day means more than 2.8 million emails are sent every second and some 90 trillion emails are sent per year. Around 90% of these trillions of emails are spam and viruses.

What can we do? There are a few things that will slow it down but I don’t think it can be stopped. Here are some steps that might mitigate the onslaught of junk email. (Congressman Mahoney, yours are definitely not junk.) Try using a web based email such as Yahoo or MSN or Gmail. They all offer free email accounts and the spam filters they use are very effective. I use Yahoo and it catches about 95% of all spam.

Windows Live Mail is a client based program (resides on our computer) that includes a junk e-mail filter. The junk e-mail filter is a list of potential spammers, and other algorithms used to identify spam. This list is updated via Windows Updates so is constantly being populated with the latest anti spam tools. Bare in mind that spammers are working desperately to get around these filters and occasionally do. Those users out there still running Outlook Express may want to consider upgrading to Windows Live Mail just for the spam filters. WLM is part of a suite of products called Windows Live Essentials which is FREE from Microsoft and can be downloaded from http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-live/essentials-other-programs. There are several other products in the suite and we may choose one, some or all of the products to download but for our discussion today we concentrate on Windows Live Mail. As a side note, if using Outlook Express now, the installation of Windows Live Mail will automatically move our address book, and old emails into the new program so set up is fairly easy.

Other programs such as MS Outlook have built in junk filters that install updates from Microsoft to identify suspect email and move it to the Junk folders for later review. There are also third party software packages like Norton AntiSpam, Mailwasher Pro and McAfee Spamkiller that integrate with client based email programs and try to filter out spam before it gets to the mail program.

But some email like Congressman Mahoney’s we want to receive. So don’t be too restrictive when making up the rules for spam email. Send the congressman an email asking that the Can-Spam Act of 2003 be strengthened because it doesn’t seem to have accomplished much in the way of cutting down spam email. Wikipedia reports that according to Steve Ballmer, Microsoft founder Bill Gates receives four million emails per year, most of them spam. At the same time Jef Poskanzer, owner of the domain name acme.com, was receiving over one million spam emails per day.

Send me an email, I won’t block you!

More interesting tidbits like this can be found in my book, Grumbles from the Keyboard. I think the book may also resolve constipation based on comments from folks that have my book and report they keep it in the throne room and read it every day.  Get your copy today!

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer (9781467985895): Courtland Nederveld: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

And if you are a reader of different genres, why not order my cookbook as well. What you say? “A technogeek writing a cookbook, this I have to see. “ Well here it is!

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks! (9781456561734): Court Nederveld: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

What’s Your Story!

Have you looked around the area lately? Forget about the construction, traffic, political issues etc. Just look around and what do you see? Next door is neighbor Joe, cutting his lawn. Across the street the new folks are adding a coat of paint to the front of the house. Around the corner, the Smiths, or Jones are enjoying a cool beverage on the deck by the pool. Drive around and look at all the quiet neighborhoods with people simply going about their business and concentrating on the tasks at hand. Some still head off in the morning to work, or school but many have paid their time in the harness and now are simply enjoying the weather, sun and camaraderie of their fellows.

As I travel around the area addressing folk’s computer problems, I enjoy the opportunity to talk to the folks I meet. Somehow the conversations always get around to something they did or do and I am always amazed as the stories unfold, at the rich tapestry of life experiences we have here in Charlotte County. I talked with a former CIA agent, a couple that spent years living and traveling on a boat and even someone that actually panned for gold out west. The stories they told of their experiences would equal any commercial novel and in fact some of them have actually written the stories down. Several have even had them published.

In years past, if I decided to write the great American novel, I would have typed it on an old typewriter with lots of correction tape and a great big dictionary beside me on the desk. Should I make a mistake such as transposing a line or decide that a paragraph didn’t really fit like I thought it would, I would spend hours retyping at least a page if not the entire manuscript. Finally, I would send it off to some publishers and if accepted by one of them they would invariably demand it be retyped again with a multitude of changes. Just the physical construction of the manuscript was time consuming, not to mention the placing of idea to words.

Today our computer can offer numerous advantages to our budding literary endeavors. Probably one of the most common software programs used by writers is Microsoft Word. This program not only allows you to set the format of the page, fonts etc. to the publishers requirements, but also offers a built in dictionary, grammar and spelling checker and if the computer is connected to the Internet, a thesaurus and reference materials right at the click of a mouse. Add to that the ability to cut and paste, move entire paragraphs with out retyping and software that will autocorrect common spelling errors.

The only drawback to MS Word is its price. It can be expensive. There are other word processing programs out there with prices all over the board. One drawback to them is that some cannot open documents created in MS Word and some create documents that cannot be opened in MS Word. There is even a FREE version of a word processor program (it also has a spreadsheet, database and other office programs) call Open Office.org that can be downloaded from www.openoffice.org. It can be configured to create documents that will open in MS Word and it will open MS Word documents that you might receive.

With the proper tools in place, we can sit down and begin to tell our stories. Write your memoirs, tell us how you bit a mouse back after it bit you. Tell us about the years spent on a nuclear submarine or how the business you sold a few years back for lots of money started on the kitchen table with $200 borrowed from the high school shop teacher. From my perspective, I find these stories much more interesting than endless coverage of political prevarications.

Sounds like a good idea but you just don’t know how to start? Remember, here in Charlotte County we have the Peace River Centers for Writers. This is a group of several hundred folks interested in putting pen to paper. Some are already published, some are hoping to be and some are just writing down their memories for the grandkids. The Writers Center is located at Edison College in Punta Gorda.  The membership dues are reasonable. They hold many workshops about different aspects of writing such as “Write Your Memories,” “The Art of Interviewing” and How to Sculpt a Story. Give them a call. Hundreds of writer guilds and groups exist in every corner of the country. Use the Internet to find the one near you. Here is a starting point for groups in Florida, www.floridawriters.net/Our_Writers_Groups.html

See you on Amazon.com!

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer (9781467985895): Courtland Nederveld: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks! (9781456561734): Court Nederveld: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734

Take Spybot and call me in the morning.

I have a friend of mine that many, many years ago, operated a bicycle store in a small town in the Midwest. One evening as we were discussing the previous ventures we had tried, he proceeded to tell me that one of the reasons he was successful in the bicycle business was that he gave away a spoke wrench with every bicycle purchased. This spoke wrench cost him about a dollar fifty. Which, considering the time that has passed since then, was a pretty good premium. So I asked him, what was it about the free spoke wrench that made him successful?

“People cannot resist trying to use the spoke wrench,” he said. People just don’t know what they are doing, but that doesn’t stop them from trying. They would inevitably break a spoke or get the wheel out of round and amazingly show up back at the bicycle shop and need their wheel straightened. This provided a steady stream of repair jobs for the slow times.

How many times have you decided that you can fix something yourself, and that the so-called trained professional simply paid his tuition and gathered his experience for nothing?

So, since I have a few spare appointments open for the next week or two, I am going to give you a free spoke wrench. (Figuratively speaking.)

The most intense battle going on in the computer world right now is how to direct you to the places on the web that others want you to see. You have heard the terms, spyware, malware and many others. Without going into a deep explanation of what they are, suffice it to say that these entities send you pop ups, pop unders, spam and in some cases actually hijack your PC forcing you to go to sites that you would never (well most of you would never) voluntarily go. In addition, if you have enough of these entities on your machine, it will actually slow down and even freeze up. Now, here is your free spoke wrench.

Go to http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html and download Spybot Search and Destroy. This program will search your entire computer for the little buggers I previously mentioned and remove them from your machine. This program is Freeware. This means that you don’t HAVE to pay for it. However, if you want the gentleman who has made it his life mission to wipe out spyware to continue, then please send him a donation. Some of you will carefully read all the details on how the program works, what to do with it, and the potential problems that may or could be caused by not following the directions. To you, I salute and good hunting. Your computer will now be inhabited by fewer of the little nasties. Those who don’t read the details, my number is at the bottom of the column. I can fix what you break.

Why do people create these insidious, perverse adware, spyware and malware programs? Pure and simple, MONEY. These things are actually little programs that are placed on your PC, often without your knowledge but more often with your uninformed knowledge. They are designed to put something in front of your eyes. An advertisement, or a chance to win something, or even sometimes to scare you into buying something. One of the most effective ones out there gives you a pop up window that looks very important and states that your computer may contain spyware. If your CD Rom drawer opens, then you are infected and please press the Buy Now button for some super duper monster spyware killer. The CD Rom drawer opens just as predicted and you click on the button. Please give your credit card number to them and you will be charged only $79.95 for this wonderful program. The fact of the matter is, they now have your credit card number and you just downloaded a program that will insure that you have a never ending supply of pop ups and spam. They infest a couple of hundred million PC’s with this little scam and maybe only one percent respond, and they just retired to Tahiti.

What are the symptoms of an infested PC? First, it will seem to take longer and longer to start up. Second, the pc will seem to run slower and slower. The Internet browser will not take you to the sites you want to go. And finally, the PC will freeze up and be non responsive.

Interestingly, I exhibit a lot of these symptoms myself, as I get older. I wonder if they sell a human version of Spybot at the drugstore?

Enjoy a good read? Grumbles from the the Keyboard is like no other “computer book” you’ve read before. It reads more like a series of short stories and oh by the way, there is computer lessons buried in the stories. Learn many tips and tricks about the computer without even knowing it happened. Many readers have emailed me to let me know the book is in the place of honor in their homes. That’s right, along side the toilet. Makes great reading while attending to constitutional matter. Enjoy.

Grumbles From The Keyboard: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Computer (9781467985895): Courtland Nederveld: Books ISBN: 1467985899 ISBN-13: 9781467985895

Tired of computers? Just want to read something different? Here is just the thing. Quick, fun, and tasty.

Epicuria: An Adventure That Really Cooks! (9781456561734): Court Nederveld: Books ISBN: 1456561731 ISBN-13: 9781456561734