Posts Tagged ‘START’

Use your remote from iTunes even while minimized

Makes your mul­ti­me­dia key­board but­tons work with iTu­nes when the pro­gram isn’t currently in focus, or is minimised.

It is com­mon to find that, when it’s not maxi­mi­sed, iTu­nes will not recog­nise your media or gaming key­board short­cuts as com­mands to play, pause, skip song, etc. This sim­ple plug-in fixes the pro­blem in most cases. It saves you having to bring iTu­nes up on screen each time you want to use the keys.

To use this plu­gin, simply copy the mmKeys.dll file into your plu­gins folder.

• For XP Users, this is found in “C:\Program Files\iTunes\Plug-ins”
• For Vista Users, it’s “C:\Users\your_username\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\iTunes\iTunes Plug-ins” and you may have to show hid­den files (or use the search) in order to see the App­Data fol­der. One com­men­ter also repor­ted that it works when put in “C:\Users\your_username\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\iTunes\iTunes Plug-ins”.
• For Win­dows 7 Users: follow Vista ins­truc­tions above.

You also need to res­tart iTu­nes to load the dll.

You can down­load the file here.

•   Mul­ti­me­dia Key­board DLL (44.0 KiB, 67 hits)

Microsoft Office 2010 Beta

So I am going through my email yes­ter­day and I come across an email from Tech­Net announ­cing the beta of Mic­ro­soft 2010.

Even though I am a huge sup­por­ter of Open Office, I deci­ded to give it a try. Since I already had a Hot­mail account, the regis­tra­tion was very sim­ple and within 5 minu­tes I was down­loa­ding the installer.

One of the first things I noti­ced when I began to ins­tall the appli­ca­tion, was the options that were not selec­ted. As seen in this screenshot, very few fea­tu­res are ins­ta­lled by default.

The ins­tall did seem to take a bit lon­ger than nor­mal, how much was part of the ins­ta­ller ver­sus my test machine is unde­ci­ded. None the less the ins­ta­ller did not take more than 20 minu­tes or so. Since I spend more time in the Word appli­ca­tion that was where I hea­ded first. It does appear that MS did lis­ten to a lot of users con­cer­ning the start orb and has repla­ced it with the File tab. The remain­der of the rib­bon bar looks remar­kably the same.

When you do go to the file tab, you get a lot more infor­ma­tion at your mouse point without having to do a lot of digging.

So off I go. As I men­tio­ned I use Open Office by default, so the first thing I did was open one of my docu­ments crea­ted in Wri­ter. It did take a few moments to bring the docu­ment up, but all of my for­mat­ting (such as it was) remai­ned. I could even save it back into the .odt exten­sion. There was the war­ning that the for­mat was not com­ple­tely com­pa­ti­ble. I ope­ned the file in Wri­ter again and everything was gol­den. That was a big check mark in my books right there. Mic­ro­soft has been drug over the coals (right­fully so) for not being more com­pa­ti­ble with other appli­ca­tions, this is a good step forward.

The next thing I wan­ted to look at was how it hand­les wri­ting to a blog (not just Mic­ro­soft Live spa­ces). I rea­li­zed how happy I was for the file menu to be back. With a cou­ple of clicks I was being promp­ted to setup my blog con­nec­tion. I selec­ted Word­press and ente­red the ser­ver and login infor­ma­tion. Next time I know, I am wri­ting the entry right now. One of the great fea­tu­res is the screenshot fea­ture. Like the snip­ping tool in Vista and Win­dows 7, the screenshot tool is won­der­ful. When you go to insert you see the option screenshot, with the down arrow, you have the abi­lity to just grab a full win­dow or use the snip­ping tool. All of the ima­ges in this post were crea­ted using this format.

So far, I must say I am actually impres­sed with the direc­tion of at least the Word por­tion. I will play with the excel por­tion later. Check back…

Abbot and Costello with new style ‘Who’s on First’

You have to be old enough to remem­ber Abbott and Cos­te­llo,
And too old to REALLY unders­tand com­pu­ters, to fully appre­ciate this. For those of us who some­ti­mes get flus­te­red by our com­pu­ters, please read on…
If Bud Abbott and Lou Cos­te­llo were alive today, their infa­mous sketch, ‘Who’s on First?‘might have tur­ned out something like this:

COSTELLO CALLS TO BUY A COMPUTER FROM ABBOTT
ABBOTT: Super Duper com­pu­ter store. Can I help you?
COSTELLO: Thanks I’m set­ting up an office in my den and I’m thin­king about buying a com­pu­ter.
ABBOTT: Mac?
COSTELLO: No, the name’s Lou.
ABBOTT: Your com­pu­ter?
COSTELLO: I don’t own a com­pu­ter. I want to buy one.
ABBOTT: Mac?
COSTELLO: I told you, my name’s Lou.
ABBOTT: What about Win­dows?
COSTELLO: Why? Will it get stuffy in here?
ABBOTT: Do you want a com­pu­ter with Win­dows?
COSTELLO: I don’t know. What will I see when I look at the win­dows?
ABBOTT: Wall­pa­per.
COSTELLO: Never mind the win­dows. I need a com­pu­ter and soft­ware.
ABBOTT: Soft­ware for Win­dows?
COSTELLO: No. On the com­pu­ter! I need something I can use to write proposals,

Track expen­ses and run my busi­ness. What do you have?
ABBOTT: Office.
COSTELLO: Yeah, for my office. Can you recom­mend anything?
ABBOTT: I just did.
COSTELLO: You just did what?
ABBOTT: Recom­mend something.
COSTELLO: You recom­men­ded something?
ABBOTT: Yes.
COSTELLO: For my office?
ABBOTT: Yes.
COSTELLO: OK, what did you recom­mend for my office?
ABBOTT: Office.
COSTELLO: Yes, for my office!
ABBOTT: I recom­mend Office with Win­dows.
COSTELLO: I already have an office with win­dows! OK, let’s just say I’m sitting

At my com­pu­ter and I want to type a pro­po­sal. What do I need?
ABBOTT: Word.
COSTELLO: What word?
ABBOTT: Word in Office.
COSTELLO: The only word in office is office.
ABBOTT: The Word in Office for Win­dows.
COSTELLO: Which word in office for win­dows?
ABBOTT: The Word you get when you click the blue ‘W’.
COSTELLO: I’m going to click your blue ‘W’ if you don’t start with some straight answers.

What about finan­cial book­kee­ping? You have anything I can track my money with?
ABBOTT: Money.
COSTELLO: That’s right. What do you have?
ABBOTT: Money.
COSTELLO: I need money to track my money?
ABBOTT: It comes bund­led with your com­pu­ter.
COSTELLO: What’s bund­led with my com­pu­ter?
ABBOTT: Money.
COSTELLO: Money comes with my com­pu­ter?
ABBOTT: Yes. No extra charge.
COSTELLO: I get a bundle of money with my com­pu­ter? How much?
ABBOTT: One copy.
COSTELLO: Isn’t it ille­gal to copy money?
ABBOTT: Mic­ro­soft gave us a license to copy Money.
COSTELLO: They can give you a license to copy money?
ABBOTT: Why not? THEY OWN IT!
(A few days later)
ABBOTT: Super Duper com­pu­ter store. Can I help you?
COSTELLO: How do I turn my com­pu­ter off?
ABBOTT: Click on ‘START’…

More Shortcuts for MS Word

   Command Name                  Shortcut Keys
   ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   All Caps                      CTRL+SHIFT+A
   Annotation                    ALT+CTRL+M
   App Maximize                  ALT+F10
   App Restore                   ALT+F5
   Apply Heading1                ALT+CTRL+1
   Apply Heading2                ALT+CTRL+2
   Apply Heading3                ALT+CTRL+3
   Apply List Bullet             CTRL+SHIFT+L
   Auto Format                   ALT+CTRL+K
   Auto Text                     F3 or ALT+CTRL+V
   Bold                          CTRL+B or CTRL+SHIFT+B
   Bookmark                      CTRL+SHIFT+F5
   Browse Next                   CTRL+PAGE DOWN
   Browse Previous               CTRL+PAGE UP
   Browse Sel                    ALT+CTRL+HOME
   Cancel                        ESC
   Center Para                   CTRL+E
   Change Case                   SHIFT+F3
   Char Left                     LEFT
   Char Left Extend              SHIFT+LEFT
   Char Right                    RIGHT
   Char Right Extend             SHIFT+RIGHT
   Clear                         DELETE
   Close or Exit                 ALT+F4
   Close Pane                    ALT+SHIFT+C
   Column Break                  CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER
   Column Select                 CTRL+SHIFT+F8
   Copy                          CTRL+C or CTRL+INSERT
   Copy Format                   CTRL+SHIFT+C
   Copy Text                     SHIFT+F2
   Create Auto Text              ALT+F3
   Customize Add Menu            ALT+CTRL+=
   Customize Keyboard            ALT+CTRL+NUM +
   Customize Remove Menu         ALT+CTRL+-
   Cut                           CTRL+X or SHIFT+DELETE
   Date Field                    ALT+SHIFT+D
   Delete Back Word              CTRL+BACKSPACE
   Delete Word                   CTRL+DELETE
   Dictionary                    ALT+SHIFT+F7
   Do Field Click                ALT+SHIFT+F9
   Doc Close                     CTRL+W or CTRL+F4
   Doc Maximize                  CTRL+F10
   Doc Move                      CTRL+F7
   Doc Restore                   CTRL+F5
   Doc Size                      CTRL+F8
   Doc Split                     ALT+CTRL+S
   Double Underline              CTRL+SHIFT+D
   End of Column                 ALT+PAGE DOWN
   End of Column                 ALT+SHIFT+PAGE DOWN
   End of Doc Extend             CTRL+SHIFT+END
   End of Document               CTRL+END
   End of Line                   END
   End of Line Extend            SHIFT+END
   End of Row                    ALT+END
   End of Row                    ALT+SHIFT+END
   End of Window                 ALT+CTRL+PAGE DOWN
   End of Window Extend          ALT+CTRL+SHIFT+PAGE DOWN
   Endnote Now                   ALT+CTRL+D
   Extend Selection              F8
   Field Chars                   CTRL+F9
   Field Codes                   ALT+F9
   Find                          CTRL+F
   Font                          CTRL+D or CTRL+SHIFT+F
   Font Size Select              CTRL+SHIFT+P
   Footnote Now                  ALT+CTRL+F
   Go Back                       SHIFT+F5 or ALT+CTRL+Z
   Go To                         CTRL+G or F5
   Grow Font                     CTRL+SHIFT+.
   Grow Font One Point           CTRL+]
   Hanging Indent                CTRL+T
   Header Footer Link            ALT+SHIFT+R
   Help                          F1
   Hidden                        CTRL+SHIFT+H
   Hyperlink                     CTRL+K
   Indent                        CTRL+M
   Italic                        CTRL+I or CTRL+SHIFT+I
   Justify Para                  CTRL+J
   Left Para                     CTRL+L
   Line Down                     DOWN
   Line Down Extend              SHIFT+DOWN
   Line Up                       UP
   Line Up Extend                SHIFT+UP
   List Num Field                ALT+CTRL+L
   Lock Fields                   CTRL+3 or CTRL+F11
   Macro                         ALT+F8
   Mail Merge Check              ALT+SHIFT+K
   Mail Merge Edit Data Source   ALT+SHIFT+E
   Mail Merge to Doc             ALT+SHIFT+N
   Mail Merge to Printer         ALT+SHIFT+M
   Mark Citation                 ALT+SHIFT+I
   Mark Index Entry              ALT+SHIFT+X
   Mark Table of Contents Entry  ALT+SHIFT+O
   Menu Mode                     F10
   Merge Field                   ALT+SHIFT+F
   Microsoft Script Editor       ALT+SHIFT+F11
   Microsoft System Info         ALT+CTRL+F1
   Move Text                     F2
   New                           CTRL+N
   Next Cell                     TAB
   Next Field                    F11 or ALT+F1
   Next Misspelling              ALT+F7
   Next Object                   ALT+DOWN
   Next Window                   CTRL+F6 or ALT+F6
   Normal                        ALT+CTRL+N
   Normal Style                  CTRL+SHIFT+N or ALT+SHIFT+CLEAR (NUM 5)
   Open                          CTRL+O or CTRL+F12 or ALT+CTRL+F2
   Open or Close Up Para         CTRL+0
   Other Pane                    F6 or SHIFT+F6
   Outline                       ALT+CTRL+O
   Outline Collapse              ALT+SHIFT+- or ALT+SHIFT+NUM -
   Outline Demote                ALT+SHIFT+RIGHT
   Outline Expand                ALT+SHIFT+=
   Outline Expand                ALT+SHIFT+NUM +
   Outline Move Down             ALT+SHIFT+DOWN
   Outline Move Up               ALT+SHIFT+UP
   Outline Promote               ALT+SHIFT+LEFT
   Outline Show First Line       ALT+SHIFT+L
   Overtype                      INSERT
   Page                          ALT+CTRL+P
   Page Break                    CTRL+ENTER
   Page Down                     PAGE DOWN
   Page Down Extend              SHIFT+PAGE DOWN
   Page Field                    ALT+SHIFT+P
   Page Up                       PAGE UP
   Page Up Extend                SHIFT+PAGE UP
   Para Down                     CTRL+DOWN
   Para Down Extend              CTRL+SHIFT+DOWN
   Para Up                       CTRL+UP
   Para Up Extend                CTRL+SHIFT+UP
   Paste                         CTRL+V or SHIFT+INSERT
   Paste Format                  CTRL+SHIFT+V
   Prev Cell                     SHIFT+TAB
   Prev Field                    SHIFT+F11 or ALT+SHIFT+F1
   Prev Object                   ALT+UP
   Prev Window                   CTRL+SHIFT+F6 or ALT+SHIFT+F6
   Print                         CTRL+P or CTRL+SHIFT+F12
   Print Preview                 CTRL+F2 or ALT+CTRL+I
   Proofing                      F7
   Redo                          ALT+SHIFT+BACKSPACE
   Redo or Repeat                CTRL+Y or F4 or ALT+ENTER
   Repeat Find                   SHIFT+F4 or ALT+CTRL+Y
   Replace                       CTRL+H
   Reset Char                    CTRL+SPACE or CTRL+SHIFT+Z
   Reset Para                    CTRL+Q
   Revision Marks Toggle         CTRL+SHIFT+E
   Right Para                    CTRL+R
   Save                          CTRL+S or SHIFT+F12 or ALT+SHIFT+F2
   Save As                       F12
   Select All                    CTRL+A or CTRL+CLEAR (NUM 5) or CTRL+NUM 5
   Select Table                  ALT+CLEAR (NUM 5)
   Show All                      CTRL+SHIFT+8
   Show All Headings             ALT+SHIFT+A
   Show Heading1                 ALT+SHIFT+1
   Show Heading2                 ALT+SHIFT+2
   Show Heading3                 ALT+SHIFT+3
   Show Heading4                 ALT+SHIFT+4
   Show Heading5                 ALT+SHIFT+5
   Show Heading6                 ALT+SHIFT+6
   Show Heading7                 ALT+SHIFT+7
   Show Heading8                 ALT+SHIFT+8
   Show Heading9                 ALT+SHIFT+9
   Shrink Font                   CTRL+SHIFT+,
   Shrink Font One Point         CTRL+[
   Small Caps                    CTRL+SHIFT+K
   Space Para1                   CTRL+1
   Space Para15                  CTRL+5
   Space Para2                   CTRL+2
   Spike                         CTRL+SHIFT+F3 or CTRL+F3
   Start of Column               ALT+PAGE UP
   Start of Column               ALT+SHIFT+PAGE UP
   Start of Doc Extend           CTRL+SHIFT+HOME
   Start of Document             CTRL+HOME
   Start of Line                 HOME
   Start of Line Extend          SHIFT+HOME
   Start of Row                  ALT+HOME
   Start of Row                  ALT+SHIFT+HOME
   Start of Window               ALT+CTRL+PAGE UP
   Start of Window Extend        ALT+CTRL+SHIFT+PAGE UP
   Style                         CTRL+SHIFT+S
   Subscript                     CTRL+=
   Superscript                   CTRL+SHIFT+=
   Symbol Font                   CTRL+SHIFT+Q
   Thesaurus                     SHIFT+F7
   Time Field                    ALT+SHIFT+T
   Toggle Field Display          SHIFT+F9
   Toggle Master Subdocs         CTRL+\
   Tool                          SHIFT+F1
   Un Hang                       CTRL+SHIFT+T
   Un Indent                     CTRL+SHIFT+M
   Underline                     CTRL+U or CTRL+SHIFT+U
   Undo                          CTRL+Z or ALT+BACKSPACE
   Unlink Fields                 CTRL+6 or CTRL+SHIFT+F9
   Unlock Fields                 CTRL+4 or CTRL+SHIFT+F11
   Update Auto Format            ALT+CTRL+U
   Update Fields                 F9 or ALT+SHIFT+U
   Update Source                 CTRL+SHIFT+F7
   VBCode                        ALT+F11
   Web Go Back                   ALT+LEFT
   Web Go Forward                ALT+RIGHT
   Word Left                     CTRL+LEFT
   Word Left Extend              CTRL+SHIFT+LEFT
   Word Right                    CTRL+RIGHT
   Word Right Extend             CTRL+SHIFT+RIGHT
   Word Underline                CTRL+SHIFT+W

Must Have Application for Thumb Drives

It’s a sign of the time, you can buy a thumb drive almost anywhere.  I have even seen them in Gas Sta­tions in the Omaha area.

There are many rea­sons to use these dri­ves: size, por­ta­bi­lity con­ve­nience, and sto­rage space, all come to mind quickly.  A lot of my exter­nal users do not even take their lap­tops to mee­tings any­more because they can keep all their pre­sen­ta­tions and such on a thumb drive and just plug into any machines.

On the other side of the coin, there are some inhe­rent risks to the trans­por­ta­tion of these devi­ces.  You may for­get them on site, lose them while get­ting something from your poc­ket, so on and so forth.  No mat­ter the rea­son, if you lose your drive, all of that data is now avai­la­ble to the per­son that finds it.

Here are some exam­ples of the type of data that can be lost by anyone:

Firm ‘broke rules’ over data loss

Home Sec­re­tary Jac­qui Smith has bla­med a pri­vate con­trac­tor for losing the details of thou­sands of cri­mi­nals, held on a com­pu­ter memory stick.

Tax web­site shut down as memory stick with sec­ret per­so­nal data of 12million is found in a pub car park

Minis­ters have been for­ced to order an emer­gency shut­down of a key Govern­ment com­pu­ter sys­tem to pro­tect millions of people’s pri­vate details.

The action was taken after a memory stick was found in a pub car park con­tai­ning con­fi­den­tial pass­co­des to the online Govern­ment Gate­way sys­tem, which covers everything from tax returns to par­king tickets.

Two exam­ples may not seem like a large amount, but if you look at the amount of data that was lost in these two exam­ples you will rea­lize how much data is at stake.

With that being said, I have found a free appli­ca­tion that will help with this.  Rohos Mini Drive Encryp­tion.  This app has a very small foot­print and once your drive is setup, you don’t have to ins­tall soft­ware on any other com­pu­ter to access that encryp­ted file.

Accor­ding to the deve­lo­pers web­site they list the fea­tu­res as:

• Crea­tes a vir­tual encryp­ted par­ti­tion volume (disk) within a USB flash drive free space
• Auto­ma­ti­cally detects your USB stick con­fig and crea­tes encryp­ted partition
• Pro­gram does not require ins­ta­lla­tion to work with encryp­ted par­ti­ton on a guest com­pu­ter. You can start it right from USB drive
• Encryp­ted par­ti­tion is pro­tec­ted by password
• Encryp­tion is auto­ma­tic and on-the-fly
• Encryp­tion algo­rithm: AES 256 bit key length. NIST approved.
• Rohos Disk Brow­ser to open encryp­ted par­ti­tion without having Admin rights
• Vir­tual Key­board — to pro­tect your encryp­ted disk pass­word from a key logger
• Auto­run Fol­der. Saved program’s/file’s short­cut will auto­ma­ti­cally start/open up upon disk connection
• The limit of encryp­ted par­ti­tion size is 2 GB

I find the soft­ware very easy to use and intui­tive.  In no time, I had car­ved 500 megs on one of my dri­ves and was moving files over to the encryp­ted por­tion.  To try out the func­tio­na­lity I han­ded the disk to my co-worker and watched as they put it in and sure enough none of the data sho­wed.  Just an exe­cu­ta­ble.  When run, the pass­word cha­llenge screen comes up.  I really do like the idea of a vir­tual key­board, par­ti­cu­larly if you are on a com­pu­ter that you do not know.  Bet­ter safe then sorry in this world.  Once the correct pass­word is ente­red and accep­ted an explo­rer win­dow is ope­ned and all your files are acces­si­ble.  It did take a few moments for me to see how to add new files to the encryp­ted volume.  Just so you know, in the explo­rer win­dow you can right click and import file.

As I said before, in this world, encrypt everything.  I highly recom­mend this pro­gram to anyone with a thumb drive.

The System Administrator from Hell

Some days I get emails that just have to be sha­red.  This is one of them.  All cre­dit to the ori­gi­nal author, though I don’t know who it is.

Recently someone called me from one of the “Out on the Floor Offi­ces”, an ethe­real place rumo­red to exist only in hypers­pace, popu­la­ted by mys­te­rious beings called Users.

She was quite fran­tic. She was having trou­ble run­ning a pro­gram through the com­pu­ter, and her mes­sage was clear enough, although rather ill-conceived: “My files are full!”

I furro­wed my brow, lit a smoke, and explai­ned to her, “Really now, Miss Rus­sell, I don’t have time for this.” I slowly exha­led the menthol vapors as I stop­ped her pro­cess, crushing any hopes she may have had of ever again seeing that docu­ment she had spent three hours sla­ving over.

“I was typing this really impor­tant let­ter, and it has to be ready in an hour… there’s all this stuff on my screen that I didn’t type… it says something about an error, should I read it to you?”

“No point. Just press return.”

“Oh my, it wants my user­name. Can I res­tart that where I left off?”

“Not a chance.”

I drew another puff and tos­sed the phone aside. It occu­rred to me that if I had to hear one more of those whi­ning com­plaint ses­sions, heads were going to roll. Where do you peo­ple get this stuff? I’m going to tell you what’s really going on here. Now lis­ten up. I’m not going over this a second time:

Com­pu­ter

The black box that does your work for you. That’s all you need to know.

Res­ponse Time

Usually mea­su­red in nano­se­conds; some­ti­mes mea­su­red in calen­dar months. The gene­ral rule is: Shut up your com­plai­ning about res­ponse time.

Hard­ware

See “Com­pu­ter.” Again, not your concern.

Soft­ware

If we want you to know, we’ll tell you about it, other­wise, leave us alone.

Net­work

Don’t worry about it, we’ll take care of it. Use it to send mail among your half-wit sel­ves, and don’t think we won’t read it all. What do you think we do all day? By the way , Rus­sell… shame about your mother’s Pancreas.

Data

The gene­ral rule is: Don’t use any data files and if you find any, delete them before I find out about them. In fact, just stay off the com­pu­ter. (See “Res­ponse Time”)

Sys­tem Crash

Don’t ever call the sys­tem mana­ger to tell him you think the com­pu­ter is down. Don’t call him to ask him when it will be up again. The more you bother him, the lon­ger it takes.

Down­time

Like I said, don’t ask.

Uptime

Be thank­ful for it, use it wisely, and get out of my face.

Over­time

Don’t be ridiculous.

Vaca­tion

A time during which I don’t have to put up with your sni­ve­ling. Don’t try calling. There’s no point.

Com­pu­ter Room

Keep out, you’re not invi­ted. Don’t knock on the door — don’t even think about it. I broke the phone last time one of you jerks called me, and I’m not about to replace it. And keep your greasy fin­gers off the windows.

My Office

The name says it all… it’s mine; stay out.

Your Pro­blems

The name says it all…

Dead­li­nes

The gene­ral rule is: Dead­li­nes are not ack­now­led­ged by me; they’re not my res­pon­si­bi­lity. Go tell someone who cares.

Main­te­nance

1. A valid rea­son for shut­ting down the sys­tem at any time.
2. Much more impor­tant than anything any of you bozos do.
3. Anything I choose to call “main­te­nance” is maintenance.

Soft­ware Upgrades

Far too com­plex for you to com­prehend. If I tell you I’m upgra­ding the sys­tem, just be quietly thank­ful. It’s for your own good, even if it does mean exten­sive down­time during peak hours.

Elec­tro­nic Mail

I delete it before it’s read, so don’t bother sen­ding any to me.

Defaults

We like them just like they are; we chose them for a rea­son. Don’t mess with them; con­si­der them mandatory.

Error Mes­sa­ges

I’m not inte­res­ted. I’m going to kill your pro­cess any­way, so keep them to yourself.

Killing your Process

1. Don’t ever ask why
2. Beyond your control
3. No war­nings are given
4. The high­light of my day
5. If you call, it’s going to hap­pen. No exceptions.

Pass­words

I reserve the right to change them without notice at any time. I choose them, and the more you bother me, the more degra­ding yours will be. (Exam­ple: jrus­sell: SNOTFACE)

Users

1. They slow down the computer
2. They waste my time
3. A gene­ral nuisance
4. Worse than that, actually

Soft­ware Modifications

You don’t know what you want — we’ll tell you what you want. It stays like it is. Period.

Pri­vi­le­ges

I’ve got them, you don’t need them. Enough said.

Prio­rity

Mine is higher than yours, accept it. That’s the rea­son my games run fas­ter than your lousy accoun­ting pac­kage. (See “Res­ponse Time”)

Ter­mi­nals

Before calling me with a ter­mi­nal pro­blem, con­si­der this:

1. Are you pre­pa­red to do without one for weeks?
2. Do you REALLY want your pro­cess killed?
3. Did you just trip over the cord again?
4. Of course you did.

Disk Space

I set the quo­tas, you live with them. If you need more space, check “Data Files”.

Ope­ra­tor

I hired him and I trai­ned him. He does what I tell him to. Usually armed; always dangerous.

Bac­kups

A good idea if I gave a shit, which of course I don’t.

Lunch

The only time that calling my office won’t result in the killing of your process.

Data Secu­rity

That’s your pro­blem. I’m cer­tainly not going to lose any sleep over it. My files are loc­ked up tight. I feel secure.

Jiffy

Length of time it takes me to resolve your pro­blem by killing your process.

Eter­nity

Length of time it takes me to give a shit about any pro­blem that can’t be resol­ved by killing your process.

Impos­si­ble

1. It can’t be done (as far as you know)
2. I can’t be bothered
3. You’re star­ting to annoy me

Ine­vi­ta­ble

1. Couldn’t have been avoided
2. Not my fault (as far as you know)
3. The result of anno­ying me

Menus

If it’s not on the menu, don’t ask for it. It’s not avai­la­ble. If it is on the menu, it’s pro­bably of no use or it doesn’t work. We’re wor­king on it (See “Eternity”).

Uti­li­ties

I find them quite use­ful, you’ll find them quite inac­ces­si­ble. Besi­des, they’re not on your menu, are they. What did I tell you about that?

Nui­sance

You.

Of course, I reserve the right to add, change, or remove anything from the above list. I’m not asking you to accept these mat­ters without ques­tion, I’m telling you.

Now that we all know where we stand, I’m sure there’ll be no future pro­blems. If you have any ques­tions or com­ments please feel free to keep them to your­self. If you feel the need for more infor­ma­tion, I highly recom­mend that you ask someone else.

Sin­ce­rely,
The Sys­tem Manager

P.S. The new disk quota of 30 blocks per user became effec­tive yes­ter­day. Anyone caught excee­ding the quota will lose their accounts (this means you, Russell!)

What’s old is new again

Yes­ter­day, Mic­ro­soft put out an advi­sory to a secu­rity vul­ne­ra­bi­lity spe­ci­fic to the Win­dows Vista, Win­dows Ser­ver 2008 SP2, and Win­dows 7 RC ope­ra­ting sys­tems.  No other Win­dows ope­ra­ting sys­tems, inc­lu­ding Win­dows 7 RTM are impacted.

Holy cow, once again the older sys­tems (you go XP) are more secure then the new sys­tems.  Why is that you say?  Well this exploit was first found a decade ago.  Yes, you did read that correct, in 1999 this was dis­co­ve­red and patched for the ope­ra­ting sys­tems at the time.  Yet no one thought to put that into the: Newest, Most Secure, Latest and Grea­test ope­ra­ting systems.

So what is this vulnerability?

Accor­ding to Microsoft:

What might an attac­ker use this vul­ne­ra­bi­lity to do?
An attac­ker who suc­cess­fully exploi­ted this vul­ne­ra­bi­lity could take com­plete con­trol of an affec­ted sys­tem. Most attempts to exploit this vul­ne­ra­bi­lity will cause an affec­ted sys­tem to stop res­pon­ding and restart.

I like the last four words, “stop res­pon­ding and res­tart”.  We had an acronym for that back in the day.  BSOD.  But out of all of this, the thing that bothers me the most is Microsoft’s response:

Mic­ro­soft is con­cer­ned that this new report of a vul­ne­ra­bi­lity was not res­pon­sibly disc­lo­sed, poten­tially put­ting com­pu­ter users at risk. We con­ti­nue to encou­rage res­pon­si­ble disc­lo­sure of vul­ne­ra­bi­li­ties. We believe the com­monly accep­ted prac­tice of repor­ting vul­ne­ra­bi­li­ties directly to a ven­dor ser­ves everyone’s best inte­rests. This prac­tice helps to ensure that cus­to­mers receive com­prehen­sive, high-quality upda­tes for secu­rity vul­ne­ra­bi­li­ties without expo­sure to mali­cious attac­kers while the update is being developed.

Mic­ro­soft is con­cer­ned that this new report of a vul­ne­ra­bi­lity was not res­pon­sibly disc­lo­sed? Excuse me what?  It’s not new, it was disc­lo­sed pro­perly the first time.  Why do others become res­pon­si­ble for your oversight?

With that said Mic­ro­soft has issued two do it your­self reso­lu­tions until they can get a patch pushed.

The first is to Disa­ble SMB2 in the registry:

Impact of wor­ka­round. Host will not be able to com­mu­ni­cate using SMB2.

1. Click Start, click Run, type Rege­dit in the Open box, and then click OK.
2. Locate and then click the follo­wing registry sub­key:
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services
3. Click Lan­man­Ser­ver.
4. Click Para­me­ters.
5. Right-click to add a new DWORD (32 bit) Value.
6. Enter smb2 in the Name data field, and change the Value data field to 0.
7. Exit.
8. Res­tart the “Ser­ver” ser­vice by per­for­ming one of the following:
   • Open up the com­pu­ter mana­ge­ment MMC, navi­gate to Ser­vi­ces and Appli­ca­tions, click Ser­vi­ces, right-click the Ser­ver ser­vice name and click Res­tart. Ans­wer Yes in the pop-up menu.
   • From a com­mand prompt and with admi­nis­tra­tor pri­vi­le­ges, type net stop ser­ver and then net start ser­ver.

The second is to Block TCP ports 139 and 445 at the firewall:

Impact of Wor­ka­round: Seve­ral Win­dows ser­vi­ces use the affec­ted ports. Bloc­king con­nec­ti­vity to the ports may cause various appli­ca­tions or ser­vi­ces to not func­tion. Some of the appli­ca­tions or ser­vi­ces that could be impac­ted are lis­ted below:

• Appli­ca­tions that use SMB (CIFS)
• Appli­ca­tions that use mails­lots or named pipes (RPC over SMB)
• Ser­ver (File and Print Sharing)
• Group Policy
• Net Logon
• Dis­tri­bu­ted File Sys­tem (DFS)
• Ter­mi­nal Ser­ver Licensing
• Print Spoo­ler
• Com­pu­ter Browser
• Remote Pro­ce­dure Call Locator
• Fax Ser­vice
• Inde­xing Service
• Per­for­mance Logs and Alerts
• Sys­tems Mana­ge­ment Server
• License Log­ging Service

Per­so­nally, I would block those on your inter­net facing fire­wall of you broad­band router.

Forget Park Place, I want to buy the Red Square

In case you have not hear about it, Mono­poly is going glo­bal.  Accor­ding to Daily Mail UK, Goo­gle has been in con­tact with Has­bro to make a new Mono­poly game that uti­li­zes Goo­gle Maps.

With the release of the game, you will not only be able to buy the stan­dard upgra­des – House or Hotel, you will also be able to say, put a sta­dium on your pesky neigh­bors house.  Don’t like your current office buil­ding?  Buy the area, put up a skyscraper.

Not only will there be the stan­dard modi­fi­ca­tions to the lots and upgra­des, the chance cards will now give the option to build a pri­son or a gar­bage dump.  The pos­si­bi­li­ties of where to put that are endless.

Accor­ding the article:

Pla­yers start the free game with three million Mono­poly dollars and can buy Dow­ning Street for $231,000, while Pennsyl­va­nia Ave­nue in Washing­ton, where the White House stands, costs $2 million.

Rent is paid auto­ma­ti­cally each day, from $50,000 for a house to $100 million for a skyscraper.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1211686/Monopoly-goes-global-giant-online-game-using-Google-Maps.html#ixzz0QX6bL8Ps

I for one, look for­ward to pla­ying.  I have been wai­ting for a major change in the game for a very long time.  Next one they need to do is Risk.

Free Online Games

Ori­si­nal - Gor­geous Flash ani­ma­tion, per­fect for kids

Web Sudoku- Are you addic­ted to sudoku? Then you’ll love Web Sudoku, the place for a new sudoku puzzle every day.

Games.com – Lots of free Online games Like Puzz­les, Cards, Spots, Arcade and More.

1980 Games- My favo­rite – I love Pac­Man! Take a walk down the 1980’s memory lane with 1980 Games, a site dedi­ca­ted to the great 1980’s clas­sic video games.

Minic­lip Games- This is where you’ll find Runes­cape, Heli Attack, and more free Web game goodies

MSN Games- The nume­rous multi-player games that are avai­la­ble encou­rage a sense of com­mu­nity as pla­yers inte­ract in online game rooms or lob­bies, while pla­ying games using Win­dows Live Mes­sen­ger, and while on their cell pho­nes when pla­ying Win­dows Mobile ver­sions of the games.

Hallo­ween Games Online- Any­time is the right time for a spooky Hallo­ween game.

Fan­tasy Sports- Get your fan­tasy sports game on.

Teagames.com is a great place to find good, free multi-player games, as well as lots of extreme sports free web games.

Pop­Cap Games should carry a war­ning label, because these free web games are highly addictive.

AddictingGames.com should not be visi­ted if you have any work to do. You’ll find games here ran­ging from Mayhem in the Skies to Ulti­mate Field Goal Kicking.

c64s.com -  You can play all sorts of free Com­mo­dore 64 games at c64s.com, inc­lu­ding Com­mando, Bub­ble Bob­ble, and Bruce Lee.

Crazy­Mon­key Games – Flash based games, a lot to choose from

Armor Games – More Flash games.

Thanks to Tech­no­buzz for star­ting the list.  if you know of any, please add to the comments.

Easily Remove Ads from Gmail

I enjoy the mas­sacre of ads. This sen­tence will slaugh­ter ads without a messy bloodbath.

What a quote to start off with I know.  But the power of those lines is ama­zing in gmail.  If you have a gmail account that you check through the web inter­face, those sen­ten­ces in your sig­na­ture or email body will stop ads in their track.  Not only for you, but who­me­ver you send the email to, if they use gmail also.

To setup your sig­na­ture, you will want to go to the set­tings link in the upper right hand corner

Gmail Set­tings

About half­way down your set­tings page you will find a block for your signature:

Sig­na­ture Block

Most peo­ple will pro­bably think you are nuts or in a bad mood if you leave that in your sig­na­ture, so you may want to inc­lude a disclaimer.

Thanks to Lifehac­ker for this trick.