December 25, 2001
PETE'S SOMETIME NEWSLETTER
December 25, 2001
Hi Ya'll,
Due to @Home's scheduled demise February 2002, they have begun thinning out their customer base — with no or insufficent notice to those dumped. As a consequence, a large number of Web sites, even US Government ones, suddenly dissapeared. I kept dead links in this issue because there is no way to know whether a Web page has simply been removed, or whether a site was forced off the air by @Home and it will come back to life when a new host is found.
At the very bottom of this Newsletter is an experiment. "Feedback" sports an animated button in this issue. Please test it (click it) for me and tell me if the button does not work for you, or does not appear at all in your copy. Please send failure reports to pr_cox@yahoo.com and include the name and version of your e-mail reading program. Thanks.
If you'd like to see 360-degree views, or just plain old pictures, of our decorations, click here.
If your e-mail program has the option of transmitting outgoing mail to a Yahoo! Mail SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) server (and it does if you retrieve mail from your Yahoo Mail account with a desktop e-mail program,) read on.
Yahoo! has changed it's rules for accepting outgoing mail. Yahoo will stop accepting your outgoing mail on January 15, 2002 unless you can prove — "authenticate" — you have a Yahoo! Mail account. Yahoo claims they are adding the authentication requirement to "help reduce SPAM." Wish they said how. Maybe it helps document Yahoo accounts that are sending high volumes of mail so they can close those accounts "for cause." If this works, do not be suprised if your ISP, and other e-mail accounts you may have, add this requirement also, if they haven't already done so.
Authenticating your outgoing mail merely requires clicking a Check Box in your e-mail program. Following are the instructions for Outlook Express. The instructions for Outlook, Eudora, and Netscape Messenger are similar and can be found here (the instruction to check the required box is missing from the Netscape instructions, but they will tell you where to find the SMTP section if you don't remember.)
Outlook Express
Now Outlook Express will send your Yahoo! Mail Account Name and Password to the SMTP server to prove you are allowed to use it to get your outgoing mail started on its way.
Ever hear of flame fractels? If that's a new one to you, too, then I'll show you a mess of them. Some will definitely make desktop backgrounds that will make you the envy of your office!
Dial up users, go here first to see small views and pick the ones you would like to see full size.
High speed connectors can jump directly to the full size pictures. They are about 1500×1000 pixels. For starters, I suggest looking at picture numbers 009, 012, 072, 102, 148, 149, 157, 170, and 191. I liked those the most, but there are so many I may have missed seeing some. I suggest pressing F11 when you view the big pictures and moving the bottom and side sliders to mid screen to give you an idea of what they would look like as a background. If the Task Bar doesn't drop down when you press F11, click the file's task bar icon and then the picture and the Task Bar will drop.
When you right-click a picture and select "Save Picture As..." remember to set Type = Bitmap(.bmp) if it's going to be used as a desktop or folder background. Mac and Unix users, I don't know what the correct choice is for you guys. Also name them something meaningful. I chose names like "Flame009" and "Flame191" to keep them grouped in my Photos folder.
After you've downloaded your choice of pictures, when you run Display Properties/Background and Browsed to wherever you put the pictures, you'll find some make beter backgrounds with "center" selected, some with "stretch" (which squishes and/or stretches the picture to fit your monitor's display area.)
The site owner says the pictures may be freely downloaded and distributed so long as the copyright info on some of the pictures is not removed, and for those without copyright info on the picture that you include "Copyright (C) Scott Draves <spot@cs.cmu.edu>" with your transmission message, and the recipient do likewise if he/she passes it on. Also, if you have a photo processing program (see next section,) you are free to play with the pictures to your heart's content; resize, crop, whatever.
If you've ever wanted to play around with one of those "professional" drawing/photo touch-up/screen capture programs but aren't about to lay out multi-hundreds of bucks for one, here's your chance.
Use the Feedback link at the bottom of this newsletter to request a ZIPed copy of Paint Shop Pro 3.12 for Windows 95 and up, it's about 1.9MB, and I'll send you a download link. This offer is only to readers of this Newsletter. Please don't pass the link on to your friends (but you can pass on the Newsletter :-).)
After UNZIPping the file into an empty folder, click PSP.EXE to install the program. This is a 1995 "trial" version and can't do the more fancy stuff current versions can, but it's fully functional and doesn't expire at the end of the 30-day trial period - you just have to put up with a "nag screen" when the program starts (click its Close button.)
These kinds of programs really eat up memory. Close everything you can before starting one, and save your work very often to free up the memory being used by the un-do buffer. (As an alternative, you can set a Preference in this program to work to-and-from disk rather than soley in memory, which may slow response down a bit.) This particular program version may freeze without warning when it does run out of memory. If that happens, immediately press Ctrl-Alt-Del and click End-Task on Paint Shop Pro, then do a reboot (Start + Shut Down + Restart). If you don't immediately reboot, your entire system will freeze or give you the BSOD (Blue Screen of Death.) At least that's been my experience.
American Airlines reminds folks carrying on Christmas, or any, presents: Do not wrap them. The security people will probably make you unwrap them for inspection. If they are not in another carry-on container, they'll eat into your two bag carry on limit. If you're not getting on a nearly empty plane, you may be forced to have them treated as last minute baggage if there is no room in the bins.
Save the aggravation. Ship them ahead of time, or stuff 'em in a carton and check it as baggage.
Wotch is offering a free e-Book Bible (King James Version) in a download install file of only 1.2MB. How did they get the Bible compressed to that size?
This "Bible" turned out to be New Testament only, and only the first two pages of each book. The whole thing is an advertisement to buy the full ebook Bible. We live and learn.
The Nimda virus which cropped up in September 2001 (of which there are already five or more variants) takes advantage of a horrible Internet Explorer bug. Some Web pages have background music, and Internet Explorer can read those. Well, the worm includes itself as a .wav sound file. Once the browser downloads the file, the .wav player looks at the file and realizes it isn't a .wav but a .exe. And what does it do with this mislabeled file? Does it throw an error and exit? Warn the user? Of course not. Instead, it just passes the worm on to be run. This means that just browsing can infect your machine.
An embedded link to a .wav file on the Web in, or a .wav file attached to, an e-mail could also be Nimda in disguise.
The Shoho virus, a.k.a. Welyah, (read about it) which cropped up in December 2001 also exploites this vulnerablity. This virus arrives in an e-mail as an attachment called "readme.txt." Would you open it? I probably would. But this particular readme.txt is really the Shoho excutable file posing as a plain text file, and it would be passed on unquestioned to the operating system to execute.
If you are not running Internet Explorer 5.01 SP2; or IE 5.5 SP2; or IE 6.0 and OE 6.0, then go here (but see next section) to find links to the bug killer. Microsoft says if you have Internet Explorer 6.0 but still have Outlook Express 5.x, then you are still susceptible, unless you upgraded to IE 6.0 from one of the IE 5.x SP2's.
To check your versions, in both Internet Explorer and Outlook Express, click Help and About. Below the program name there will be a string of numbers, such as 6.00.2600.0000. If the numbers on both programs begin with a "6" you're okay. If they begin with a "5" and end in "SP2", you're okay. Otherwise, it really is time to get updated or upgraded. IE 5.5 SP2. IE 6.0.
On Dec 13, Microsoft released more security patches specifically for IE 5.5 SP2 and 6.0. This patch is a cumulative patch containing all security fixes plus new ones for those two Internet Explorer versions. Information about the patch and link to the patch are available here. Microsoft considers some "flaws" fixed by this patch as a critical security risk.
Note 1: Microsoft no longer supports any Windows browser lower than IE 5.5 SP2.
Note 2: If you don't feel like subscribing to the Security Update Bulletins, then check in here every couple of weeks to see whether there is anything new which affects you. Macintosh users: This applies to you too.
Important: On a Windows 9.x/Me system, when upgrading Internet Explorer to 6.0, Microsoft says you must select Full Install. I apologize for not warning everyone sooner. I just spotted this undocumented (on the IE 6 Download Page) requirement hidden away in a Security Bulletin, of all places, as this Newsletter issue was going to press.
Perhaps that explains why one of our readers lost all of her Outlook Express e-mail when she upgraded to Outlook Express 6 after previously upgrading to Internet Explorer 6. I'm guessing the Full Install forces the upgrade of both.
A Full Install (as opposed to a Minimal Install) is generally a good thing. It will make sure Outlook Express, Media Player, NetMeeting, Active-X, etc. are also brought up to date and any program and security fixes are applied. In other words, Microsoft is trying to keep Internet Explorer and all those other programs which may interact with it in sync.
But Full Install also has a dark side. What if you've uninstalled that disk hogging NetMeeting (like I have) because you just can't find an excuse to need it. The Full Install will reinstall NetMeeting. The solution? Use Custom Install and remove the check marks from the "along for the ride" programs you don't want, but make sure Outlook Express (if you use it) is checked even if you have to add the check yourself. However, as much as I hate the appearance of Windows Media Player 7, I recommend letting it be updated if it's checked — version 7.1 fixes a serious security problem if you have an older version, and I believe there may be an additional security fix to 7.1; either could be the cause for the checked box.
I've been using the Custom Install since moving from Internet Explorer 5.0 to 5.1 using the above "rules" and have never had a problem (knock on Formica!) And always remember, before upgrading or installing any program, close all running programs you can and use your Ctrl-Alt-Del fingers to kill anything remaining except for Explorer, SysTray, and firewall. Yes, even your antivirus program. If you don't explititly trust the source of the program, download and scan it before installation rather than doing a "Run from here" or "Open" from the Web, even if the download page instructs you to click "Run now" or "Open"; that is one instruction you can safely disobey and click "Save" (to disk) instead and click the file name to install it later.
The Microsoft Knowledge Base is one place to look for answers about problems you may be having with a Microsoft software or hardware product for PC or Mac. Trying to find whether there is something there which might help can be daunting at times. No matter what you type in the Query Box, you end up getting nothing, or you receive gobs of stuff which does not apply to your problem.
I just discovered a page within the knowledge base which contains important Knowledge Base Key Words. The page says it applies only to Windows 98/Me. (Don't believe it. MS is just being nasty because they don't support Win 95 anymore.) This key word page hasn't been updated recently. Two other keywords are "win2000" and "winxp".
Suppose you are getting an error message when you try to print something from Outlook Express in Windows 95. Your first stab might be "windows 95 outlook express printing error." Using key words only, you'd type "outexw95 and kbprint and kberrmsg" to zing right in on all content specifically about your problem.
Normally, in a 24 hour period, I average two access attempts per hour. During the height of the Code Red/Code Blue "epidemic", I was getting many hundreds per day and bursts of 10 attempts per second. Do you still feel you don't need a firewall because you're on a dial-up connection?
It looks pretty hot (or cold) out there. Do you really want to run that errand right now? Look in the SysTray for the current temperature at the recording site closest to your home. Click on it for a real-time report of your weather conditions, current weather radar, and a five-day forecast. Or click Setup and enter the ZIP of anywhere else (except Anchorage, AK — that's usually all screwed up.)
Download the free WeatherBug, enter your ZIP code, connect to the Internet, and all this is yours. Version 3.0 uses 3% of System Resources and 7-8MB of Memory on my system.
During the download you may be asked whether you want some other "very useful" (I don't remember its name) free program included. Say "NO" - it's really a quite useless program.
Most likely we've all seen beautiful pictures of Jupiter's Red Spot with three smaller White Oval storms below it which resemble satellite views of hurricanes. Those Jovian storms, which cropped up in the 1930's, are actually anticyclones, extreme high pressure systems with outward circulation of air masses.
In 1998 those white oval storms began merging and became one in 2000.
If you don't have time to read the story and see the pictures of the 3,2,1 process, and want to jump straight to a striking picture of the approaching merger of the last two storms, click here, then press F11 if you're using Internet Explorer.
In early Dec 2000, the Cassini space craft, on it's way to Satern, took a serindipitious picture as it passed Jupiter. It caught the moon Io passing near the Red Spot, along with Io's shadow. Are Jovian virgins sacrificed during an eclipse caused by Io? Would their Ed McMahon say, "EYE-Oooooo! Heeeere's Virgin"?
Microsoft IntelliMouse "Optical" for Windows and Mac. Why did I put up so long with scrapping the crap off my old mouse's internal roller bars and wheel every three or four days? This is a Christmas present you won't regret buying for yourself or family. The side buttons (bars) are a wonderful time saver. Squeeze with the side of your thumb and you just saved yourself from having to move the mouse cursor to the window's upper right and clicking the Back arrow. Squeeze the other side and the Forward operation is performed.
For righties or lefties, this rodent works on just about any surface with a rapidly changing pattern or texture, so long as it is not mirror finish or highly reflective. I works without a hitch on my fake oak wood grain desktop, old or "pre-washed" jeans, and the wide black panels in my "plush" bathrobe.
Street price: $40 or less
If you're partial to Track Ball mice, MS also has an "optical" one of those. Right handed only. Track ball is under the thumb. It's a bit less expensive, too. I've read one review on it, and the reviewer really liked it.
There is a more expensive "Optical Explorer" model of both mouse styles, but the only benefit I see in those is to Bill Gate's wallet.
Sarasota, Florida: Politician Robert Stein was running for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida. He placed a strong second in the Democratic primary with 26 percent of the vote. This coming even after he revealed that he would soon be pleading insanity to a charge that he beat up a police officer who he thought was a Robot attacking him.
This and other stories from around the world at Bozo of the Day.
This section is just an illustration of some of the gadgets virus writers sprang on us in the last 12+ months which I thought interesting from the viewpoint of how they try to trick us, and what the virus does and how it does it.
(Another) AOL Password Stealer
This one, called APStrojan, can infect non-AOL users receiving e-mail from infected AOL accounts. The article tells what to watch for in your e-mail (Subject: hey you; Attachment: mine.zip) but I'm sure, sooner or later, someone who knows how to program will "fix" the code to change the Subject, message text, and Attachment name. This trojan horse has been around for over a year, so a bunch of variants have sprung up. The latest one, APStrojan.qa@MM, appears to be causing a lot of trouble on AOL, and according to the article, AOL users have been warned about it via "a link". How many of you AOL folks saw it? I do not know whether Macintosh users of AOL are susceptable.
The McAfee link at the bottom of the article is no good. Here is the correct link to McAfee's description of the virus. This description is Windows oriented, tells what to look for if you think you may be infected, how to reverse the damage done, and remove the virus.
Another I LOVE YOU variant
See http://www.zdnet.com/zdhelp/stories/main/0,5594,2583071,00.html. If you've kept your anti-virus program's signature files up to date, it should catch the nasty attachment.
The next two spread very rapidly for a while. See http://www.cai.com/virusinfo/encyclopedia/ for general descriptions. Your anti-virus program vendor's site probably has specific info on these.
W32/ProLin a.k.a. Shockwave VB6 Worm -- Arrives via e-mail attachment
Subject: A great Shockwave flash movie
Body: Check out this new flash movie that I downloaded just
now ... It's Great
Bye
Attachment: CREATIVE.EXE
Navidad Worm -- Arrives via e-mail attachment
Subject: Variable or missing
Body: Variable or missing
Attachment: NAVIDAD.EXE or EMANUEL.EXE
Sonic Worm -- Arrives via myriad means
This little bugger is tricky. He just hides in your computer being as carefull as he can not to alert you to his presence. He looks for credit card and bank account numbers, passwords, watches where you go in the Internet and makes a copy of your key strokes if it thinks you're entering credit card info or logging in to your online bank or telephone records. Then it "phones home" with the info. It can also receive instructions "from home" to change its appearance so an anti-virus program won't spot it, or to update itself to do something it wasn't originally programed to do.
The ZoneAlarm site has an interesting description of this stinker's abilities and activities. It's not spreading rapidly yet, but even if you do become infected before your anti-virus program spots it, ZoneAlarm will alert you if it tries to phone home (pops a dialog asking for permission for some program you never heard of to access the Internet) and automatically blocks attempts from the Internet to communicate with the worm.
You can Vote for your Favorite New Wonder. So far, well over 5.8 million votes have been cast. The most votes, about 24.5%, have come from Puru. The United States is in 4th place, casting about 6% of the votes. Overall, votes have been received from 238 countries. The Taj Mahal, Pypamids at Chitchén Itzá, and Great Wall of China are the top three candidates to date.
Click on the VOTE link to see pictures of your choices, with a small check box beneath to click to cast a vote. Scroll to the bottom of the page to register your votes. Click on a picture to open a new window containing a slightly larger picture and a short description of the structure. While most candidates are several centuries old, newer ones such as the Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, and Sydney Opera House are included.
This isn't a "just for the fun of it" project with no real meaning. Apparently there is some serious funding behind it. When the seven winners are chosen, a seven-part TV documentary will be made, one hour for each site, along with an IMAX film, and a book published.
The link provided above is for the English language. Folks more comfortable with another language should go to New7Wonders.com where they can make their language choice.
Amazon.com will sell you books-on-tape/CD, and if you're willing to download them instead of having them shipped, the price drops nearly 50 percent (at least it did a few months ago.) How you get them from your computer onto cassettes or CDs to listen to in the car is your problem.
AOL-Time Warner now owns most of the Road Runner ISP service, and Time Warner will manage it.
| Y2K Bug strikes late? | In Norway, 29 trains refused to start because their onboard computers didn't recognize the date Dec. 31, 2000. |
| 7-11 stores couldn't scan credit cards on New Years Day 2001 because the point-of-sale terminals thought it was 1901; I guess the POS terminals knew neither they nor credit cards had been invented yet. |
'Til next time,
Pete
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2001 Peter R. Cox, All Rights Reserved