Tech News Blog
4-08-05
Microsoft Has Good Side: Helps Bust Creeps
It is tempting to bash Microsoft and many times, they have it coming, but this story by CNET exemplifies the some of the good work the company is performing.
Microsoft tool helps combat threat to kids
Product created with Canadian authorities has already helped nab one alleged child pornographer, company says. [CNET News.com]

Tuesday's Microsoft Patch Important
Speaking of Microsoft, the patch that will be issued this Tuesday will contain patches for Windows and Office that are important from a security standpoint. According to the e-mail I received from Microsoft, several of the updates have been graded critical and one of the
flaws repaired is an MSN issue, the latest entryway for crackers and phishers. CNET has the following report on this issue:
Critical Windows patch on the way
Microsoft's monthly batch of fixes will tackle important flaws in Windows, Office and other applications. [CNET News.com]

Virtual Grading is Here
I have to admit that after grading a never-ending stack of papers for the last two weeks this story has significant appeal to this teacher. A University of Missouri professor has developed a program that can save up to two hundred hours a semester. I'm sure the next step will be to reduce our pay, but as a graduate teaching assistant they will not hurt my bottom line greatly: nothing from nothing leaves nothing!
Teachers leave grading up to the computer
University of Missouri sociology professor develops program that grades essays and saves more than 200 hours of work a semester. [CNET News.com]

Ad-aware Users Have Update Available
If you use Ad-aware (and you should) an update is available according to VersionTracker. If you haven't run Ad-aware for several weeks, time to let it perform it's magic again.
Ad-aware SE Reference File - SE1R3R37 07.04.2005
latest reference file [VersionTracker: Windows]

Names Been Changed to Protect the Innocent
What’s in a name, the potential for a lawsuit apparently if the name of the company is Mandrake. BetaNews is reporting that Mandrakesoft is changing their name to Mandriva and the open source distro called Mandriva Linux; check out the story for the gory details:


Open Source Updates
The following operating systems are the subjects of Secunia bulletins: Fedora (1, 2) and Mandrake (1, 2, 3).

Multiple Platforms.com Tip of the Day: A Real Live Endorsement -- CarsDirect.com
We used it and although buying a car is not usually described as painless, this came close to just such an experience. And can you say fleet prices? We paid under invoice and then some for our new car. If you live in Northern California, you should point your search towards Vacaville Volkswagen and say hi to their fleet sales manager Adam from me. If you are interested in a car anywhere, please help this web site and use the link below for your online shopping pleasure.

What is RSS?
Wikipedia defines RSS as,"RSS is used to provide items containing short descriptions of web content together with a link to the full version of the content. This information is delivered as an XML file called RSS feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. An orange rectangle with the letters XML is often used as a link to a site's RSS feed. In 2004 and 2005, use of RSS spread to many major news organizations, including Reuters and the Associated Press, after several years of use by weblogs, technology publications and other early adopters. The first online news site to use RSS feeds was Variety.com in June of 2002. Under various usage agreements, providers allow other websites to incorporate their "syndicated" headline or headline-and-short-summary feeds. RSS is widely used by the weblog community to share the latest entries' headlines or their full text, and even attached multimedia files. (See podcasting, broadcatching and MP3 blogs.) A program known as a feed reader or aggregator can check RSS-enabled webpages on behalf of a user and display any updated articles that it finds. RSS saves users from having to repeatedly visit favorite websites to check for new content or be notified of updates via email. It is now very common to find RSS feeds on most major web sites, as well as many smaller ones."

Tech News Blog
4.07.05
Sharing Your Music Library Has New Meaning
A club in Boston is taking the sharing of music libraries to new levels with a promotion that lets customer become an .MP3J according to a story from Boston.com/. Allston’s Common Ground Bar and Grill started the weekly event to let patrons share the music on their iPod or MP3 player with everyone. I like the term: .MP3J it is almost as slick as the term ‘clinking’ coined by Leo Laporte, The Tech Guy on KFI a speech shortcut for ‘click on the link.’

Free T-Mobile Hotspot Service for .Mac Members
If you are a .Mac member, or sign up to become a member you can try out T-Mobile’s HotSpot Service free for thirty-days. Apple will also award those that sign up for the annual plan with 20 free iTunes songs. This is just one of the benefits available to .Mac members. You can sign up for a .Mac account and help support this web site by clinking on the .Mac logo on the left side of this page.

PowerBooks Have Ram Problem
Some PowerBook users are having issues with the lower memory slot. Check your RAM by clicking on the Apple logo in your tool bar and then choose 'About this Mac'. Visit MacFixIt to read more about the PowerBook's problems.
RAM slot(s) failing in some PowerBooks
A growing number of readers are reporting an issue where the lower (or less frequently, upper) memory slots in some PowerBooks fail, leaving users with less available RAM than is actually installed [MacFixIt]

Duke Dudes Get Tunes Again
Duke University will continue their policy of distributing iPods to incoming freshmen according to the MacObserver:
Duke University Renews iPod Initiative
Duke University, which made headlines last year by giving iPods to all 1,600 freshmen, will continue... [The Mac Observer]

Computer Associates' Flaw Exposes Users to Denial of Service
According to CNET, Computer Associates' eTrust Intrusion Detection System has a serious flaw that can leave users open to a denial of service attack from crackers; read more by clicking on the following link.
CA security system vulnerable to DoS attacks
Flaw in Computer Associates' eTrust Intrusion Detection System could make it susceptible to denial-of-service attacks. [CNET News.com - Security]

Secunia also has a bulletin regarding this event if you would like a more detailed explanation of the flaw:
CA eTrust Intrusion Detection CPImportKey Denial of Service
A vulnerability has been reported in CA eTrust Intrusion Detection, which can be exploited by malicious people to cause a DoS (Denial of Service). [Secunia - Latest Secunia Security Advisories]

Review of SuSE Linux 9.3 Professional
LinuxToday has a review of SuSE Linux 9.3 Professional, read more here:
Mad Penguin: First Look at SUSE LINUX 9.3 Professional
"SUSE has been one of the major players on the desktop for as long as I can remember, and for good reason..." [Linux Today]Open Source Updates

Open Source Updates
Secunia announced that these open source systems have updates: FreeBSD, Red Hat, Gentoo (1, 2, 3), and Ubuntu.

Multiple Platforms’ Tip of the Day: OpenOffice Works For All
I have reviewed the OpenOffice application that is available for the PC platform previously and I’ve found it to be effective as a replacement for Microsoft’s Office. This past weekend I got a chance to take the Mac version for a test drive and of the two available for this platform, I really like the smaller application NeoOfficeJ from OpenOffice.org/. The program does all the things we expect a word processor to do and in some cases more. The interface is intuitive and it converts Word and AppleWorks documents with little to no loss of formatting. This is an excellent freeware tool available for Multiple Platforms users and you should try it out. It does require the installation of X11 if you haven’t already installed it on your Mac and the program is included in the download package from OpenOffice.org/.

What is Freeware?
Shareware, freeware, and the other assorted –wares were the subject of a weeklong ‘What is’ series, however the tip of the day prompts a repeat of this definition, albeit from a different source, Answers.com: “Software that is available for free, usually over the Internet.” Free is good, we like it like that!

Tech News Blog
4-06-05
The tech news is blog style today, enjoy!

This Postcard Isn't a Pretty Picture

Another fun use of the Internet has now been co-opted by crackers. Read about the latest threat, postcard Trojans at PC World.

Web Postcards Hide Trojan Horse Programs
Instead of friendly greetings, malicious software installs on your PC. [PCWorld.com - Latest News Stories]

Daily Dose of Despair

Just like clock work and dependable as that old rooster, here is your daily dose of bad news from Internet security gurus. See what all the crowing is about at CNET.

Bigger phishes ready to spawn
Phishing attacks may have slowed, but their sophistication is increasing at a rapid pace. [CNET News.com]

Microsoft: We're Better Than You Are

Speaking of crowing, Microsoft is claiming their study demonstrates the best operating system comes from Redmond, WA according to a report from

Microsoft touts latest Windows v. Linux study
Blog: Another Microsoft-funded study has been released that says Windows is better than Linux. This time the issue is reliability. ... [CNET News.com]

Not So Fast

Not all the noise from Microsoft was as happy at the above item, read more about the latest delay at CNET.

Windows supercomputer version delayed
Microsoft had hoped to deliver it by fall, but now says a final version won't arrive until early next year. [CNET News.com]

Class Action Suit For Alleged Spyware Infiltration

More evidence that we are sacked and tired and we're not going to take it anymore is demonstrated by this story from eWeek.

Spyware Lawsuit Alleges Computer Hijacking
The class-action lawsuit accuses DirectRevenue of using spyware to infiltrate users' computers, learn their Internet browsing habits and track their Internet use. [eWEEK Technology News]

Open Source Updates
Secunia released the following bulletins for the open source world: Fedora (1, 2), Red Hat (1, 2), Trustix, and Ubuntu (1, 2).

Multiple Platforms’ Tip of the Day: Get Your Mail
Mozilla has a great e-mail client, Thunderbird. I had tried it several months ago, but hadn’t migrated to it from Apple’s e-mail client, .Mail; and now that I have my only thought is: why did I wait so long. It has an incredible array of features that everyone from computer newbies to power-users will find useful. Mozilla offers the application for Multiple Platforms although I haven’t tried it on my PCs (because I don’t use my PCs for email, period). I have talked to several PC users that are using Thunderbird and they all gave positive reviews of the tool. I like it because it allows you to digitally sign and encrypt outgoing messages and has an RSS reader included. Read more about Thunderbird at Mozilla.org/.

What is an E-mail Client?
According to Wikipedia, “An email client (or mail user agent [MUA]) is a computer program that is used to read and send email. Protocols supported by email clients include POP3 and IMAP. IMAP and the updated IMAP4 are optimized for storage of email on the server, while the POP3 protocol generally assumes that the email is downloaded to the client. The SMTP protocol is used by most email clients to send email. In addition to the fat client email clients presented here, there are also web-based email programs such as SquirrelMail, Gmail and Hotmail. America Online also has an email client as a component of its Internet access program.

Another important protocol supported by most email clients is MIME which is used to send binary attachments. Attachments are files that are not part of the email proper, but are sent with the email.

MAPI (Messaging Application Programming Interface) is a proprietary Microsoft Windows API which can be used to access the Microsoft Exchange email server or to interact with the Microsoft Outlook client.”

Tech News Blog
4-05-05
Turning the Tide on Phishers
A plethora of stories regarding phishers permeates the tech news today and most of these stories are of the positive variety including the arrest of a man in Estonia that has reportedly transferred millions of Euros from banks throughout Europe. CNET reports that the man may have infected hundreds of computers with a Trojan horse program and then extracted vital information. Google is also joining the battle against phishers and is pro-actively protecting their Gmail customers from suspicious messages. According to CNET, Google is displaying the following warning for any communications that look shady: "Warning: This message may not be from whom it claims to be. Beware of following any links in it or of providing the sender with any personal information." And as I was writing this item, a message with the following subject line arrived in the inbox: “YOU ARE WINNER(CONTACT YOUR AGENT)”. All I have to do is click on a convenient link to claim my lotto prize from the Lotto International/ World Gaming Board. WOW, I have been approved for a payment of $500, 000 (USD)! Well, that seals it, who wants to be paid in dollars with the current de-valuation? If it had been in Euros, I would have clicked on that link in a heartbeat. Oh well…

Mozilla Firefox Flaw
Secunia reports that Mozilla’s Firefox browser has a flaw caused by a JAVA script engine issue. Secunia recommends that you, “Disable JavaScript support.” If you would like to read a less technical account of the problem, eWeek has an article on the issue.

IM Becomes Risky Business
CNET features another story today about the increase in attacks by crackers exploiting instant messaging programs. The report states that these types of attacks have increased a whopping 250 percent during the first quarter of this year! In a related story, an e-mail worm named the Chod.B can arrive through the your e-mail and then uses MSN messenger IM client to infect other PCs. Security experts called this latest morph of a virus “alarming”, according to CNET.

Microsoft Offers Freebies for Tablet Users
If you are a Tablet PC owner, make sure you check out the Experience Pack that will be available free from Microsoft later this week. According to PC World, the included Ink Desktop application will let you write directly on the screen and provide computer navigation functions. Check out the story at PC World or click here to get the Experience Pack.

Open Source Updates
Secunia has released these bulletins for open source users: Gentoo, Debian (1, 2), Ubuntu, Conectiva, SuSE, and Linux.

Multiple Platforms’ Tip of the Day: VoIP Recommendation
If you are looking to add a phone line for your home or business, Skype might be your solution. I have wanted an additional line for business purposes but the high cost and a low-budget prevented me from pursuing that goal; now thanks to Skype I have two business lines: one each for the east and west coast of the USA. The phone lines also include voice mail and for 10 more Euros, I added SkypeOut so I can dial landline phones through my Mac. Skype also sells traditional handsets that connect to your PC to use as a conventional phone system. The bottom line: two new business lines-in and one line-out for less than 40 USD, WOW! The quality of the calls is outstanding and you certainly cannot beat the price. In case you can’t tell, I really like this product. MacWorld is featuring Skype in an article today.

What is VoIP?
Answers.com has this definition for VoIP: “The two-way transmission of voice over a packet-switched TCP/IP network. The terms "IP telephony" and "voice over IP" (VoIP) are synonymous.

Starting in the late 1990s, the Internet and its TCP/IP protocol suite began to turn the telecom industry upside down. IP has become the universal transport for all voice, data and video communications worldwide. Today, every communications carrier has built or is using an IP telephony backbone for some or all of its voice services. In addition, large enterprises are either already using IP for some amount of internal voice traffic or have plans to implement it or create test beds.”

Tech News Blog
4.4.05
Mixed Messages Multiply
Last week we carried reports from CNET regarding a decrease in the number of phishing attacks using email messages as an entry tool and that sounded like good news. Well this is a new week and with it comes a new message: phishers have cut bait and are now pharming; they are using controlled or ‘poisoned servers’ to help re-direct web traffic. According to PC World, this new crack in the Internet uses the domain name system (DNS: click on link for Wiki definition) to fool other servers into directing traffic to their phony web sites. With this swindle, the Pharmers no longer require bait to set their hook. This is a serious problem and the remedy will initially rely on blocking traffic to IP addresses associated with this activity, a move that can only be implemented at the network level.

Migration to SP2 at a Glacial Pace
Even though evidence points to a rapid decline in the glaciers of the world (1, 2), the masses of ice, glacial drift, and melting water still move slowly. Many businesses have adopted this same momentum when it comes to implementing Microsoft’s Windows XP Service Pack 2 update. CNET estimates that only 24 percent of businesses using Microsoft software have fully installed the latest patch. Microsoft has done research their own research that indicates the implementation is closer to 75 percent; no surprise as any researcher can, with a little planning, design a survey (or experiment) to demonstrate exactly what the person in the big chair at the end of the hall wants to see. The day of reckoning is approaching as Microsoft has notified users that the grace period will end on April 12, and after that date, you will not be able to block the automatic download of SP2.

Do You Have SP2?
If you haven’t installed Microsoft’s SP2, you might want to before you try and use TurboTax (see the items below: Multiple Platforms Tip of the Day) and if you are not sure if you have the update installed, follow this path to find out: Start/ Control Panel/ System. The system window will display the operating system installed and if you have installed the update, you will see the words Service Pack 2. Remember to completely clean you PC of spyware and viruses before attempting to update to SP2. A majority of those Windows users that experienced problems with the update had spyware or virus issues before the installation of the patch and these bugs created some serious problems. Those of us that installed the patch on a clean system experienced little or no disruption in normal operations.

Open Source Updates
Secunia announced the following updates for open source users: Debian (1, 2), Mandrake (1, 2), Gentoo (1, 2), Red Hat (1, 2), and Ubuntu.

Multiple Platforms Tip of the Day: What Version is This? TurboTax Cares!
Sometimes the difference between a successful update and a failed attempt comes down to the issue of compatibility, and in the case of TurboTax, the wrong version of Internet Explorer can produce migraines, profanity, and an oath to use another tax preparation software in the future. The version required for Windows users is IE 6 and if you are not using it, you won’t be able to update TurboTax. TurboTax also functions much better (only?) with Service Pack 2. I had no problems using the Mac version of the software (in fact it was a easier than ever), but I have included directions for Apple users to check their versions of IE too. Note to PC users: to see how easy things are in the Mac world compare these two operations.

PC Tip of the Day: What Version of Internet Explorer is Installed
Microsoft has a rather long and complicated way of determining which version of Internet Explorer you have installed; but I found a much easier path: Start/ Search/ then choose “All files and folders” and search for “Shdocvw.dll” (without the quotes). When the search is complete, right-click on any of the matching results and you will see a dialogue box and the first entry will display the version of IE you currently have installed. Click on the General tab and you can see exactly when the file was last modified and accessed.

Apple Tip of the Day: Check IE Version
Apple users really have it easy when checking a version of any software, just click on the name of the application in the toolbar and select “About (this program)”. That’s it; no searching, no reg edit searches and no stinking badges…

More About TurboTax Issues
Another bug-in-the-ointment for PC users trying to update TurboTax is the presence of a pop-up blocker. To disable your pop-up blocker using Internet Explorer choose Tools from the toolbar of IE, then select Pop-up Blocker and click on Turn Off Pop-up Blocker. Don’t forget to turn it back on when you are done updating TurboTax. This same feature keeps many of the students at our school from taking online quizzes and surveys. Pop-ups, can’t live with ‘em, and cannot live without ‘em.

What is a Library?
In my state, libraries are what you close when the county runs out of money. According to Wikipedia, a library in the computer world is, “In computer science, a library is a collection of subprograms used to develop software. Libraries are distinguished from executables in that they are not independent programs; rather, they are "helper" code that provides services to some other independent program. Today the vast majority of the code that executes in a typical application is located in the libraries it uses.

Well-known libraries include:
_ LINPACK for solving linear matrix problems
_ C standard library, whose implementations include glibc
_ The Standard Template Library for C++
_ Graphic libraries such as DirectX and OpenGL

The process of making resources available to other programs in a library is called exporting. Most common forms of exports include procedures (functions, routines, subroutines), variables, and some sorts of static data, e.g. icons. Exported procedures are also called entry points, because invoking them is akin to "entering" the library. In order to allow access to them, the resources receive names, which are written down inside a table, also containing their offsets inside the file. These names (and sometimes, by analogy, the resources they represent) are called symbols. Similarly, the table is called a symbol table. Executables are less likely to have a symbol table (they are not mandatory and are usually stripped down to save space). Aside from that, from most other aspects, the difference between libraries and executables in modern operating systems is limited.”