The Outer E Newsletter of the Channel Islands PC Users Group d

April 2005 The Outer Edge Page 1

The club needs some help, and I am asking, or even begging, for it. Most of you come to a meeting sit down and get your questions an-swered, attend a class and see a presentation. At the termination of the meeting, you leave and go home.

Did you ever stop to think how many people give just a few hours monthly so we can be a successful club? We need volunteers for the

board. You do not have to be a techie to be an officer or to be a board member. I am sure many of you could bring many ideas from your experience in the business world; please consider helping. I am also looking for two people to assist in pro-gramming, not to head it up or take responsibility but just to contact two or three companies and speak to their user group liaison to arrange a presentation date mutually convenient to all. I am also looking for three or four people to help

with Membership. Our membership is slipping, as is that of most user goups, usually 5-12 percent annually. We need someone to be the con-tact between the colleges in the area to let the students know they are invited to attend. When Fry’s opens in May, I hope we can get a few people to hand out our fliers a few hours on Saturday to let their shop-pers know there is a club and what we do. I am sure this will increase membership.

We have requested help with the SIGs and received few, if any, re-plies. Isn’t there a special program you use that you could share and show to other members? I feel that a few of you could demonstrate Ex-cel, Adobe Elements, updating drivers, backing up data or demonstrate a few of the available search engines. How about just sharing the favorite Web pages you browse.

We have a club of over 300 members and about 20 workers. These workers all do a small job for the club, each giving a few hours monthly,

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April 2005 Vol. 18, No. 10

To Contact CIPCUG The Outer Edge...........(805) 485-7121

General Information.. . . . . . . (805) 604-7538 Mailing Address...P.O. Box 51354, Oxnard, CA

93031-1354

Board recommends bylaws revisions; vote set for April 23

Your Board has spent numerous hours going over the bylaws and up-dating them. They are posted on our Web page, and we ask the members to review them. We plan to vote on these changes at our April 23 gen-eral meeting. (This is the definite date now. — Editor) The Web site allows members to vote via the Vote Ballot if they can’t make the meeting.

See the summary of major changes on page 16.

Attendance at the March general meeting

85 members and 8 guests We welcome 4 new members

COMMAND.COMCOMMAND.COM

By David Harris, President

E d g e

Newsletter of the Channel Islands PC Users Group

Whole No. 217 ISSN 1055-4399

The Friendly Computer Club Helping Make Computers Friendly. On the Web at www.cipcug.org

The Outer

HARRIS

Page 2 The Outer Edge April 2005

Root Directory

Channel Islands PC Users Group

CIPCUG mailing address: P.O. Box 51354, Oxnard, CA

93031-1354

Executive Board (Elected officials)

President……………….……David Harris …………….………[email protected] Vice President/Program Chairman ………………...Craig Ladd...….482-4344 ………………[email protected] Secretary……………..Martha Churchyard ……………………[email protected] Treasurer…………….……....…Art Lewis ………………….…[email protected] Past President……………...…..Andy Toth ……...………[email protected]

Ex-officio members of Executive Committee

(Appointed Officials) Chief Protocol Officer……...George Lakes CIPCUG ISP Signups………...Helen Long Computer Show Coordinator.Dick Otterson .......………….………[email protected] Go-fer Extraodinaire……….Dick Otterson Legal Adviser..……………..John Stanton Librarian……………......………….Vacant Marketing Director………...Ron Pinkerton Membership Chairman.……...Ken Church ....………………[email protected] Newsletter Editor…………....John Weigle Program Chairman…………….Craig Ladd Publicity Chairman………..…David Harris SIG Coordinator…………Lois de Violini …………………………[email protected] Tech Support…………………..Toby Scott Web Page Editor……………..Helen Long …………………[email protected]

Past Presidents Walt Yates............ ..............1987/1989 Lois Evans de Violini............1989/1991 Terry Lee............. ..............1991/1993 Jerry McLoud........................1993/1995 Robert Provart.......................1995/1997 Toby Scott.............................1997/1999 George Lakes………………1999/2001 Andy Toth........... ....... ….2001/2003 (With the exception of the immediate past president, past presidents are not members of the board.) Life members Frank Segesman* Toby Scott Lois Evans de Violini *Deceased

CIPCUG is a member of APCUG, The Association of PC Users Groups

The Outer Edge

Editor……………………..John Weigle P.O. Box 6536, Ventura CA 93006 485-7121………[email protected]

The Outer Edge is published monthly by Channel Islands PC Users Group, an independent, nonprofit corporation. Contents of The Outer Edge copyright 2001 by Channel Islands PC Users Group. Permission for reproduction in whole or in part is granted to other computer user groups for internal non-profit use provided credit is given to The Outer Edge and the authors of the reproduced material. All other reproduction is prohibited without prior written consent of Channel Islands PC Users Group. Opinions expressed in this journal are solely those of the authors or contributors, and do not necessarily represent those of Channel Islands PC Users Group, its officers or membership as a whole. The information provided is believed to be correct and useful, however, no warranty, express or implied, is made by Channel Islands PC Users Group, its officers, editorial staff or contributors. This disclaimer extends to all losses, incidental or consequential, resulting from the use or application of the information provided. Channel Islands PC Users Group does not endorse or recommend any specific hardware or software products, dealers, distributors or manufacturers. All trademarked or registered trademarked names are acknowledged to be the property of their respective owners, and are used for editorial purposes only.

Advertising in The Outer Edge

Advertising is accepted for computer-related materials, businesses and services only. Rates are for Camera-Ready copy (clear, clean black and white masters). Typesetting and graphics are available at an additional fee. SIZE Cost/Issue FULL-PAGE (9½”H x 7¼”W)................$50.00 HALF-PAGE (4½”H x 7¼”W) or (9½”H x 3½”W )....…........$30.00 THIRD-PAGE (3”H x 7¼” W QUARTER-PAGE (4½”H x 3½W)..........$20.00 BUSINESS CARD ad...............................$15.00 Discounts for multiple issues (3, 6, 9 and 12 months) Ad copy deadline is the 10th of the month of publication. Make all checks payable to CIPCUG.

CIPCUG NEWS Benefits 19

Coming CIPCUG events 3

Command.com 1

F1: Your help key 18

Map, schedule 20

Membership report 17

Program: Creative Labs 8

Q&A, business meeting 4

Steering Committee 4

TOE contributors (2005) 16

Treasurer’s report 4

Web page news 12

Windows and Hardware SIG

9

GENERAL

Bits and bytes 10

Penguin’s lair: Saving Knoppix directories

12

Rick’s rants: Problems with proprietary hardware

11

Tips from Smart Comput-ing magazine

16

ADVERTISEMENTS

Copy Court 15

Ventura County Computers

13

Bylaws changes 16


Programs This month’s program will feature

The Digital Photo Guy. The meeting will be on Saturday, April 23, at the Camarillo Boys & Girls Club, 1500 Temple Ave. (northeast corner of Pon-derosa Drive and Temple Avenue), Camarillo (see map on page 20).

The doors open at 8:30 a.m., and the Beginners SIG and Internet SIG start at 8:45 a.m.

The Digital Photo Guy is an engi-neer turned sales/marketing executive who has spent more than 35 years in high technology and finally decided to do what he enjoys. The Digital Photo Guy now spends his time researching digital camera technologies and tech-niques so he can present the most up-to-date and useful information to digital camera users. This information is of-fered via free workshops at timeshare resorts, PC user groups, computer clubs, RV parks and cruises.

How can The Digital Photo Guy offer workshops for free?

The Digital Photo Guy is actually a publishing company. He writes books, produces videos and creates CDs about digital photography and cameras. He offers his information products for sale to workshop attendees.

The Digital Photo Guy also conducts paid photography workshops in con-junction with several leading resorts in San Diego. Please see their schedule for coming workshops. These are intense five-hour workshops that include a photo shoot at various San Diego loca-tions such as the San Diego Zoo, Wild Animal Park, Balboa Park, beaches, mountains and the desert, depending on the season.

Other coming programs: May 28 (fourth Saturday) June 18 (fourth Saturday) July 23 (fourth Saturday) Aug. 27 (fourth Saturday): Smart

Computing Sept. 24 (fourth Saturday) Oct. 22 (fourth Saturday) Nov. 19 (third Saturday): Gene Bar-

low Dec. 17 (third Saturday)

Programs being worked on include Corel on Word Perfect and PaintShop Pro, Dave Whittle and Adobe. If you have a program idea or request, please let any board member know.

A new SIG for beginners only

Gracia Marks, who is going to start a new Beginners SIG this month, wrote the following introduction for it. — Edi-tor

Are you totally confused by all the terms flying around? Do the questions being asked sound like gibberish? And the answers are even more confusing? Are you certain that everyone is talking a language that you have never heard before?

Yes, they are talking computerese, a language of the computer geeks. Would you like to learn this strange language so you, too, can get answers to your com-puter problems?

Here is your chance. Starting at the April meeting there will be a new SIG. This will be a very basic series for those of you who feel overwhelmed by our more knowledgeable members. Learn the secrets to which they are privy, and you, too, can know your way around the computer world.

The SIG will be at 8:45 a.m., before the regular meeting, at the same place. Get a head start on understanding the questions and answers in the help ses-sion of the meeting.

Come prepared with a list of the terms that you do not understand. The first few sessions will be on terminol-ogy. After that, who knows?

See you there! Other Special Interest Groups

Unless otherwise noted, Special Interest Groups (SIGs) meet at Ventura County Computers, 2175 Goodyear Ave., Unit 117, Ventura; phone 805-289-3960. From the 101 Freeway, exit at Telephone, take Telephone south to McGrath, turn left and go one block. Turn right on Goodyear and then right again into the second driveway. Unit 117 is the back, right corner of the industrial building.

Unless otherwise noted, SIGs run from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Special Interest Groups (SIGs) are sponsored by CIP-CUG and led by volunteer club mem-bers. There is no charge for members to attend the SIGS.


Society news: Programs and SIGs

Digital Photo Guy to present April program Door prizes

The club door prizes for this month are: Kingston 128 MG USB 2.0 Flash Pen

Drive Imation 100 x CD-R 700 MB (80 min)

52x, cakebox, storage media Symantec Norton System works 2005

complete package, 1 user, STD, CD, Win Microsoft XP Plus Digital Media Edi-

tion Norton AntiVirus 2005, complete

package, 1 user, CD, Win Estimated retail value: $220. We have two types of raffle tickets:

one for prizes offered by the presenter and one for club-provided prizes. The tickets for the presenter’s prizes are free and limited to one per member.

The tickets for the club-provided prizes are $1 each, $5 for six tickets, $10 for 13 tickets and $20 for 26 tickets and are available to anyone.

Consignment table

A consignment table is set up at every meeting. Anyone can buy, but only mem-bers can sell. The club gets 10 percent of the sales price. A tag with the seller’s name, CIPCUG membership number, item name, item description and price must be placed on each item. Sold items must be picked up at the end of the day’s meeting. Any items not picked up will become the property of CIPCUG and will be subject to disposal at the club’s discretion.

CIPCUG is not responsible in any way for items bought or sold at the table. Each item is sold as-is unless otherwise stated.

Meeting, SIG notices

If you would like e-mail notices of regular meetings and SIGs, go to www.cipcug.org, where you’ll find a link on the home page to sign up. The URL is http://cipcug.org/listserv.cfm.

You will need your membership number, which is on your TOE mailing label, to complete the sign-up.


By Martha Churchyard, secretary

Society news: Business meeting, Q&A

Society materials now stored at our meeting place in Camarillo

Treasurer’s report By Art Lewis <[email protected]>

February 2005 Category Description 2-1 through 2-28, 2005 INCOME ISP Income 540.00 New Members 70.00 Raffle 36.75 Renewals 490.00 Software Sales 19.00 TOTAL INCOME 1,155.75 EXPENSES ISP Expense 424.00 Rent Paid 140.00 Storage 50.00 TOE 546.75 Uncategorized Expenses -0- TOTAL EXPENSES 1,160.75 TOTAL INCOME— EXPENSES -5.00

Unrestricted Funds 7,446.36 Restricted Funds 2,000.00 Bank Balance 2-28-05 9,446.36 Year to Date Income 10,337.94 Year to Date Expense -10,577.61

Business meeting President David Harris presided and called for the

usual reports. CIPCUG now has storage space in the Camarillo Boys & Girls Club and has given up the self-storage space that was costing $50 a month.

Web mistress Helen Long asked members to send her their favorite Internet links to be shared on the CIPCUG Web site.

Treasurer Art Lewis gave the February financial report. Several large purchases were made in March that will show up in next month’s report, including a projector, microphones, and storage cabinets.

David asked for a volunteer to pick up the doughnuts before the monthly meeting. Volunteers are also needed for many tasks which keep the club running smoothly. Most do not require computer expertise. If you can help, please contact David.

Candidates are needed for the coming board elections. Please read the proposed bylaws revisions, which will

most likely be voted on at the April meeting. Members who would like to get information on

coming meetings should go to the Web site and sign up to receive it. The new anti-spam laws ban any notices that are not specifically requested. Q&A Session

Unless otherwise noted, questions were answered by Toby Scott, a partner in Ventura County Computers and our technical adviser. Michael Shalkey handled the dem-onstrations projected on the screen.


March Steering Committee meeting

The CIPCUG Executive Board meeting was held on March 29, 2005, at 7 p.m. at the home of George and Arline Lakes.

Present: Ken Church, Martha Churchyard, Lois Evans, David Harris, Toby Scott, Craig Ladd, George Lakes, Art Lewis, Helen Long, and Connie Vaughn.

Art Lewis gave the Treasurer’s re-port.

Ken gave the membership report, and Craig reported on future programs.

Helen reported on ISP membership and the Web site.

SIGs were discussed. The successful ones, HTML and Linux, have a continu-ing theme. The most-requested subjects are graphics and digital photography, but the problem is finding someone to lead them. David will put something in the TOE.

The Boys & Girls Club now has a manager for its computer lab.

She is eager to have CIPCUG teach classes there, preferably at 4-5 pm.

The sound system still had problems at the last meeting.

The club may need to buy a new amplifier.

We got a quote for one system, but the board agreed we should get another quote before deciding.


More on Q&A: Page can’t be displayed ‘The page cannot be displayed’ error message

Someone gave me a printout from his browser that says, “The page cannot be displayed.” The most likely explana-tion is that his Internet connection is down. If it happens once, it’s a glitch, but if it happens more often, there is something wrong with your system. (Demonstrating) If you have a connec-tion, but the page does not exist, the message is, “Page cannot be found.”

For those of you who do network troubleshooting, what is the first rule? The first rule of networking is, it’s al-ways the cable. I can’t tell you the num-ber of hours I, and every tech I know, have spent diagnosing problems that could be fixed by changing a stupid ca-ble, or just plugging it in. If it isn’t the cable, you may have a problem with the electrical outlet or some kind of electri-cal problem that causes the power to fluctuate — particularly if you see flick-ering lights. It could be causing the router to go up and down.

Incidentally, power fluctuations are really hard on your computer. Get your-self a UPS — an uninterruptible power supply, a battery backup. If you have

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and the tasks are done. Please consider giving a few hours

monthly to your club. Your board can’t do it all, and the present volunteers have and will continue to give assistance. Join the Team.


More Command.com

Here is the schedule for the balance of April and all of May:

April Thursday, April 21: Topic and

moderator TBA Saturday, April 23: Michael

Shalkey on What’s this about Blog-ging, and Wikis and RSS? What do

these words mean and why do I care? This SIG will be at Roundtable Pizza, Ponderosa Drive and Arneil Road.

Thursday April 28: Linux. An installation of Linux (if all goes well) onto the CIPCUG computer at Ventura County Computers.

May Monday, May 2: CANCELLED

Wednesday, May 11: Toby Scott on HTML / CSS.

Thursday, May 19: Moderator and topic TBA

Thursday, May 26: Linux. Mod-erator TBA.

Saturday, May 28: Michael Shalkey, topic TBA, Round Table Pizza, 12:30-2:30 p.m.


More on programs, SIGs ...

power that fluctuates, it will cut off the spikes and also fill in the dips. The drops are harder on the computer than the spikes. Computers do worse with low power than with too much power. If you get down around 80 volts, you can easily blow up the power supply, motherboard, memory chips or hard drive. How safe is PayPal?

Q: Is PayPal safe to use? Yes, PayPal is safe to use. It is

owned by eBay. For those of you who don’t know, many Internet transac-tions tend to be small amounts — $5, $2, and so on. Credit cards have mini-mum charges, and it gets very messy. So they needed a mechanism to han-dle small amounts, and PayPal was developed. Put a smallish amount in your PayPal account, and make pay-ments with PayPal. Limit your expo-sure by not keeping large amounts in the account. It is safe enough so that it will cost you less in the long run, if you do a fair number of small transac-tions online. It is much better than using credit cards and that sort of thing. You don’t have to give out credit card numbers or any other per-sonal information. It is much harder for people to get money out of your PayPal account than it is to get it out of your credit card. If you pay some-one with PayPal, they can’t go back and raid your PayPal account. If you charge something with your credit card, they can go back and charge something else against your credit card. You have to find it on your statement and go argue with the credit

card company. In a lot of ways Pay-Pal is much better than credit cards. There have been PayPal hacks; money has been siphoned out of the accounts. It is not absolutely fool-proof, but if you keep a small amount of money there, your risk of loss is less with PayPal than it is with the others. And if you are really careful, you probably won’t lose anything with PayPal either.

(From audience) Virtual credit

card numbers are pretty good to use for online credit card purchases.

A: You can set them up for single transactions or by the month. It de-pends on the bank. But, truly, for small amounts of money PayPal is easier. If you are planning a large purchase, you could put, say, $500 in the account, and then pay it down to around $10, just enough to keep it active. It’s much harder for somebody to hijack that. We are talking relative safety here. Relatively, it is about the safest way to do online transactions.

Can I hook two computers to the same printer?

Q: With a printer that has two inputs, USB and centronics, can you hook two computers up to it at the same time?

A: I have no idea. I’ve never tried it. Does anyone else have experience with this?

(From audience) It doesn’t work. (From audience) I have connected

two computers with USB and parallel. It turns out that sometimes I have to



turn off one computer or put it to sleep so the other one can print. If I just start out printing to the parallel, it works, but once I use the USB port, the parallel wouldn’t work unless I put the USB side to sleep.

A: And both on parallel will work. (From audience) We have an Epson

C84, which works fine with two differ-ent inputs, one USB and the other paral-lel. We have no problem at all.

Andy Toth: I’ve done it, and I’ve used the translation box. The two com-puters go to the box, and then it has logic that controls and routes the signals.

Toby: If you have a computer that you can leave on all the time, and if you have a network at home, you can hook the printer up to that computer and then connect to it as a network printer, as a remote printer across the network.

Can I dump USB 1 for USB 2?

Q: Currently I have USB 1 on my computer. I bought a USB 2 card. Can I literally just unscrew the one and throw it away, then screw in the USB 2? Is there something else I need to know about that? I’m using XP Pro.

A: If the USB 1 is built into the motherboard, you can’t take those off. If you try, you will damage your mother-board. Normally, you just don’t use them. With XP it shouldn’t be a prob-lem.

Q: On that same subject, if you have

Windows 98 first edition, can you just go ahead and install a new USB 2?

A: No, you have to upgrade to sec-ond edition. You can do that online, with the Windows Update. If you are completely updated, you are second edition — or second edition equivalent. As long as you have updated online with all of the USB and other upgrades, so that the Windows Update page says you are completely updated, you are up to second edition specifications, although your computer might not say that. In that case you can use USB 2.

Notebook wants Asp.net password

Q: I have a question on passwords. I

have a Compaq notebook. It has been working fine for about a year, but re-cently when I boot it up, it will not let me in without a password. It says, “Asp.net machine account” for the name of the person or the guest. I don’t know anything about it. I have XP Home.

A: Did you install the .NET frame-work off of the Windows Update site?

Q: Not that I am aware of. I didn’t make any changes. Nothing happened. It just suddenly appeared. And I can’t log in at all. But I can start in Safe Mode.

A: ASP is Active Server Pages, which are used for scripting online. In order to run into online scripting, you have to be going someplace that requires the script, or you have installed some-thing that requires the script.

Something is requiring a script login, but without seeing your computer, I have no way of even guessing what has been installed that is requiring a login. Try this: Go into Safe Mode; go to Start, R u n , a n d t y p e i n “Msconfig.” (Demonstrating) If Normal Startup is selected, choose Selective Startup, then uncheck the Load Startup Items box. Turn off all the startup items. Save that and reboot the computer into regular mode, and see if it goes away. If it doesn’t work, I have no clue. If that works, you can go into msconfig in regular mode and start adding items back one by one until you figure out who the culprit is. Doing it this way turns off everything, including things like the virus scanner, so be sure to go back in and turn on the things you need.

HP printer won’t work with XP

Q: I have a new computer with XP, and I have a very expensive printer that I bought three years ago, an HP 1000-something. I can’t get it to work with XP, along with my scanners and other things. But I have a lot of hard drive space, so I was wondering if I could install Windows 98.

A: The easy solution is to go to the HP Web site and download the XP driv-ers.

Q: I tried that, but it didn’t work. A: Then let’s talk about printer in-

stallations. There are two distinct styles of printers that are relatively modern. Don’t confuse them. Make sure which one you have before you try to install them. If you do it the wrong way, they won’t work. For one type, you plug in the USB. Windows detects it, and says, “New hardware found.” You go through the wizard, and when it gets to the place where it asks for the disk, point it to the CD or the download files. The other one says DO NOT plug it in until we tell you to. Then you start their install program. At a certain point in the install program, it will say, “OK, now plug it in.” Most of the HPs are in that category. If you have tried to install it before, you have to uninstall everything before you can try this procedure. Uninstall every at-tempt that you have ever made to install HP drivers. And sometimes you have to go in and change the registry. But all the HP 1000s work just fine with XP.

Q: My other problem is with the scanner.

A: If it is USB, HP has a driver for it. Go back and uninstall just as I rec-ommended for the printer.

Strange address in address book

Q: Since the last meeting I discov-ered a strange e-mail address in my ad-dress book. You said the address is from Australia. How did that get into my ad-dress book? How can I find if anything else has happened as a result of that? How can I prevent those kinds of things from happening in the future?

A: The most likely way something gets into your address book is an option in the setup or options that automatically adds every address you reply to to the address book. This is checked by default in Outlook Express. If you send a mes-sage asking to unsubscribe, don’t send me any more e-mails, I never want to hear from you again, Outlook will put it in your address book. (Demonstrating) Incidentally, never, never reply to spam. If you have a new Windows installation, I strongly recommend that you leave this on. It is far easier to get rid of the addresses you don’t want than it is to



More Q&A: Upgrading to USB 2, Asp.net issues


More on Q and A: Unexpected activity manually type in all the addresses you do want. It is by far the easiest way to populate your address book when you are starting out. After a while it is not so useful, and you can turn it off.

My machine suddenly starts working hard for no apparent reason

Q: I have no automatic updates turned on on my machine — not Nor-ton, or Windows, or anything like that. But I will be sitting there typing a letter or something, and suddenly my machine just takes off, and something is dramati-cally happening. Is someone trying to get into my machine? Norton has ad-vised me at certain times that somebody is trying to break in.

A: Is your Norton up to date? Q: Yes, but now I’m starting to get a

message that it needs updating. A: The most likely thing causing

that is spyware. Have you run SpyBot, or AdAware?

Q: SpySweeper, yes. A: SpySweeper’s not bad, but I

would run several. Norton is pretty good at detecting viruses, so if you are up-to-date, whatever you have is probably not a virus. It is almost always spyware. No spyware detection program is more than about 65 percent effective.

(From audience) Could it be Win-dows Fast Find indexing?

A: Yes, that could be. Go into the services. Go to Control Panel, Adminis-trative Tools, then Services. Find the indexing service on the list. When it is enabled, it indexes your hard drive when there is idle time. If you do a lot of searches, it is a good thing to have be-cause it will save time. Instead of hav-ing to go out and search the whole hard drive, it will just search the index. It already knows all the files on your hard drive because the index is updating in the background. If you don’t do searches very often, just turn it off. You might try turning that off and see if it gets rid of the symptom.

OE tells me I have too much e-mail

Q: I have Outlook Express. I have a 160 GB hard drive, but recently I’ve

been getting mail that tells me I have to delete some of my sent or received mail, that there is not enough room. It never did that before. Is there some setting I changed accidentally?

A: Incidentally, there are security updates for Firefox and Thunderbird that just came out. They are up to ver-sion 1.0.2.

In Outlook Express, each item on the mail folder list is a separate folder, so when you reach the limit in one, you can create a new one and move half the messages over to it. Sort by date and move the old messages to the new folder, or whatever.

Security update failed and no updates work now

Q: One of the security updates in Windows ME failed, and now I can’t install any other updates.

A: First of all, before you do any-thing else, run a thorough virus scan and spyware scans. Make sure you get rid of everything you can. Those can interfere with security updates. Then I would go back into the Control Panel, Add/Remove programs. (Demonstrating) With Windows Me you will have differ-ent updates, but they will all be listed there. Try uninstalling some of the last ones. They should have the date on them. Go back to where you started fail-ing and uninstall the ones surrounding that. Try doing just one or two at a time.

Then try going back into the online Windows Update and reinstall. Try do-ing just one or two at a time. Normally, it checks off all of them, but you can uncheck them. Then it will do only the updates you have selected. It’s kind of a pain in the neck, but you have to break that loose, or you will have problems.

What do you think of Mailwasher?

Q: Is Mailwasher still a good e-mail previewer? The last time I checked their Web site, they were not updating it any more.

A: It is not being updated any more because so many of the mail programs now have their own Web service. The CIPCUG e-mail system has Web mail. You can log in and read your mail over

the Internet, no matter where you are in the world. So many of the e-mail pro-viders have this service, there just isn’t the market for Mailwasher. What Mail-washer does is essentially turn a POP3 e-mail account into a Web view ac-count. Also, if you were on dialup and someone sent you a gazillion byte at-tachment, it allowed you to go in and delete it without downloading it. It just downloaded a listing of the messages and files, not the whole thing. It’s a nice program, but I wouldn’t be surprised that they are not updating it. Who provides Web view e-mail?

Q: Who provides Web view e-mail, the ISP, like Earthlink, or the program?

A: Earthlink has a Web view for e-mail. There is a mail link on their startup page, and you can read your mail in your browser. Yahoo, Gmail, Hot-mail, AOL, and most of those services have it. (Demonstrating CIPCUG Web mail).

Does CIPCUG have spam filters?

Q: Does the CIPCUG site have spam filters on it?

A: This is a tale of woe: I wanted to put a spam filter on. I had a very rudi-mentary one I was installing by degrees. It started by getting rid of mail from all the known spam buckets in Africa, Latin America, Asia, etc.

So of course, the second day after I turned it on, I got a call from a minister. Her children were missionaries, one in Africa and one in Latin America, and she was complaining she wasn’t getting their pictures. To make a long story short, I have not found a mail program that I can put on our mail server that doesn’t create so many false positives that it makes my job ten times harder.

I have about 200 very specific IP addresses that are forbidden to use my server. Anytime anyone sends me more than about 200 messages in a day that I don’t recognize are blocked. Ya-hoogroups is allowed, or Microsoft TechNet, that sort of thing. If you sub-scribe to an e-letter and suddenly it stops arriving, let me know. I may have blocked it inadvertently.



Program: Creative Labs

New ways to see movies and hear music By John Weigle [email protected]

Products of Creative Labs, which produces far more than just computer sound cards, were shown off at the March meeting.

Speakers Jon Russell and Mike Orenstein, marketing associates, dis-cussed the company’s PCMCIA Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS Notebook, Zen Portable Media Center and several MP3 players.

They said that a separate sound card, as opposed to what comes on a motherboard, “does make a huge differ-ence” for music, movies and games on a computer.

(Much of the following information on products’ specifications and abilities is taken from information on the com-pany’s Web site rather than the presen-tation because it’s difficult to gather all the numbers during a presentation.)

The Audigy 2 ZS Notebook sup-ports playback for THX-certified, 24-bit/192 kHz content, including Ad-vanced Resolution DVD -Audio, hard-ware -accelerated EAX 4.0 AD-VANCED HD 3D gaming effects, and decoding for Dolby Digital EX and DTS-ES movies.

It includes Creative’s Smart Re-corder software with Audio Clean-Up technology and low-latency ASIO 2.0 driver support for 24-bit/96kHz re-cording directly to MP3 format. It also comes with MediaSource software to organize, rip and enhance a digital mu-sic collection. The Surround Speaker connector allows for simple hook up of any multi-channel system and CMSS-3D support delivers virtual surround sound over any stereo headphones.

Technical support is available seven days a week on the company’s Web site or by telephone between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. Central time, Monday through Friday.

The notebook version sells for $129.99, and a desktop version sells for $99, the speakers said.

Creative Labs was out of user group

support for several years, so there are no user group special prices, but the speakers said they hope that will come.

The included software allows sound cleaning to get rid of hiss, pops and clicks, they said, adding, “It’s really great for cleaning sound.”

For more advanced work, it’s possi-ble to get better results with more ex-pensive software, but “what we give you is very nice software,” Orenstein said.

The Zen Portable Media Center is 5 11/16 inches long by 3 3/8 inches high by 1 1/8 inches thick and weighs 11.7 ounces. Its screen is a 3.8-inch TFT LCD.

The 20 GB drive can hold more than 85 hours of video, 9,000 songs or tens of thousands of pictures, depend-ing on the encoding system used.

Digital media can be downloaded from a Windows XP-based PC via USB 2.0. The center supports Windows Me-dia audio and video formats and plays many other popular formats, including MP3s.

It costs $499.99 The speakers also showed several

versions of the Zen Micro MP3 players:

4GB, priced at $179.99; 5GB, priced at $229.99; and 6GB, priced at $249.99

The 4GB player can hold up to 2,000 WMA songs; the 5GB player can carry up to 2,500 songs; and the 6GB stores up to 3,000 songs. The players support a wide variety of music sub-scription or download services such as Napster To Go, Napster, MSN Music, MusicMatch and the Wal-Mart Music Store.

They come in 10 colors: red, light or dark blue, orange, green, pink, pur-ple, silver, black and white.

The players let the listener choose MP3 or WMA music, ripped from CDs or downloaded from online music sites and have up to a 12-hour battery life. They are 3.3 inches tall.

The players also include an FM radio with 32 preset station settings and recorder and a built-in microphone for voice recording.

For the text of a Creative Labs

handout on MP3 and WMA files, see page 10.

On the Net: C r e a t i v e L a b s :

www.creativelabs.com

Photo by Jerry Crocker President David Harris, right, presents a plaque of appreciation to Creative Labs marketing associates Jon Russell and Mike Orenstein after their presentation at the March CIPCUG meeting.


(Notes for Michael Shalkey’s SIGS are available on the Web. Go to http://www.cipcug.org, click on Education in the menu and then on Shalkey’s SIGs. — Editor)

E-mail is one of the must useful, yet

one of the most dangerous, functions available on a computer — useful be-

cause it allows almost instant communications, dangerous because it can bring spam, scams, hoaxes, viruses and mal-ware to your computer that can trap the unwary to sending money or credit card information to people they’ll never hear

from again. Michael’s SIG this month covered all these subjects. The full writ-ten notes that he showed during the presentation are on the Web at http://www.cipcug.org/sig/edanger/phish.html, along with working links to all the sites he recommended. What follows is ex-tracted from that.

E-mail dangers: Never open an e-mail attachment, and never click on a link in an e-mail. If you don’t read or remember any more from this SIG, please remember that.

Scams, phishing schemes, viruses, and hoaxes are some of the many dan-gers facing e-mail users. One of the big problems with links is that because you click on them, they can bypass your protective software (firewalls and secu-rity software).

Scams include such things as letters from widows, other relatives, lawyers or government officials from Nigeria or some other country who need help to get tens of millions of U.S. dollars out of the country and who will give you at least 10 percent for your help. Accord-ing to some statistics, this scheme is one of the top three sources of income for individuals in Nigeria. Of course, you will never see any money if you fall for this scam. The writers get you to tell them your bank account information (for them to transfer the money into, of course). If they don’t clean out your

account, they’ll ask for a little money at a time (to bribe officials and so on) and ultimately might say you have to go to Nigeria, where you’re likely to be killed.

It costs nothing to send e-mail, so it takes only one sucker to make the effort pay off.

Some helpful links: S c a m l i b r a r y : h t t p : / /

www.millersmiles.co.uk/identitytheft/spoo f-emai l -and-spoo f -web-page -library.htm

U.S. Secret Service Site dedicated to educating the public about Nigerian scams, 4-1-9 scams, and even a place to r e p o r t f r a u d e - m a i l s : h t t p : / /www.secretservice.gov/alert419.shtml

Another Nigerian Scam information s i t e h t t p : / / w w w . c r i m e s - o f -persuas ion .com/Cr imes /Bus iness /nigerian.htm

Lottery scams: You really haven’t won a lottery somewhere in the world, particularly when your first and last name are nowhere on the e-mail. That is one of the guarantees that this exact e-mail is going to thousands of people. This link speak discusses the issue of lottery scams: http://www.fraudaid.com/S c a m S p a m / L o t t e r y /lottery_scam_names.htm

Phishing: The newest and easiest e-mail danger to avoid is phishing. Phish-ing is a coined word for the practice of bad guys fishing the Internet to see if they can hook you to get your money. Usually this is in the form of an e-mail that tries to get you to log on to a fake Web site.

Phishers pretend to be a legitimate company you already do business with. They have a goal of getting your user-name and password, or even your real account information and other informa-tion they need to steal your identity and/or money.

Antiphishing.org is a Web site dedi-cated to fighting these scam e-mails: http://antiphishing.org

Important links in regard to phish-ing.:

How to avoid phishing: http://antiphishing.org/consumer_recs.html

What to do if you’ve given out your

p e r s o n a l i n f o r m a t i o n : h t t p : / /antiphishing.org/consumer_recs2.html

To report possible phishing e-mails take these steps:

— Forward the e-mail to [email protected].

— Forward the e-mail to the Federal Trade Commission at [email protected].

— Forward the e-mail to the “abuse” e-mail address at the company that is b e i n g s p o o f e d ( e . g . “[email protected]”). When forwarding spoofed messages, always include the entire original e-mail with its original header information intact.

— Notify the Internet Fraud Com-plaint Center of the FBI by filing a com-plaint on at http://www.ifccfbi.gov

Archive of Phishing e-mails: http://antiphishing.org/phishing_archive.html

Viruses: Viruses cannot be avoided these days. The best that can happen is for them to be deleted before they reach your computer — or shortly after. It’s important that, whatever antivirus pro-gram you use, you have it set to check your incoming e-mail before you even see it. Also it is important that your anti-virus program gets updated at least once a week. (Daily is better.)

Hoaxes: Hoaxes don’t destroy your computer or steal money from you, they are just a waste of time — not only yours, but also that of anyone you for-ward the e-mails to.

Hoax links: v m y t h s . c o m : h t t p : / /

www.vmyths.com H o a x b u s t e r s : h t t p : / /

hoaxbusters.ciac.org u r b a n l e g e n d s . c o m h t t p : / /

u r b a n l e g e n d s . a b o u t . c o m / l i b r a r y /blhoax.htm

Trend Micro Hoax Library: http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/hoaxes/default.asp

Snopes rumors, hoaxes, etc.: http://snopes.com

HoaxSlayer.com: http://www.hoax-slayer.com

www.truthorfiction.com: http://www.truthorfiction.com

… and from the folks who brought


Windows and Hardware SIG

E-mail is helpful — but it can be dangerous

SHALKEY


you Nor ton Ant iVi rus : h t tp : / /www.symantec.com/avcenter/hoax.html

Symantec Security Response uncov-ers hoaxes on a regular basis. These hoaxes usually arrive in the form of an e-mail. Please disregard the hoax e-mails — they contain bogus warnings usually intent only on frightening or misleading users. The best course of

action is to merely delete them. Symantec also has a library of virus

hoaxes and bogus messages. Junk mail (spam): The first word

about junk e-mail is never purchase any-thing offered to you through an e-mail. If the “company” exists and you actu-ally receive the item you want, all you are doing is encouraging more junk mail.

You’ve just proven it works. Junk mail filters will help some, but

never reply to one even if it is “Please Remove Me From Your Mailing List” since all that does is prove to the spam-mers that you actually read your e-mails and respond to them.

Your address is now worth money to those who collect databases of e-mails.


Computer briefs

Bits and bytes from here and there ...

More about e-mail dangers ...

Digital music made simple This information is from a handout

passed out during the Creative Labs presentation in March. — Editor

What are MP3s and WMAs? MP3s and WMAs are music files

that are made many times smaller in size while still keeping the same music qual-ity. Because MP2 and WMA files are anywhere from 5 to 25 times smaller than the original audio on common mu-sic CDs, you can carry hundreds of hours of music in the memory of a very small digital music player.

Where can I get MP3s and WMAs? The first place you can get legal

MP3s and WMAs is from your own CD collection. There are various computer applications that help you easily convert your CDs into MP3 or WMA files, like Creative MediaSource, which ships with all Creative MP3 players.

Simply put a music CD into your computer’s CD drive and start Creative MediaSource. Click the Rip Now, and convert your music in a few seconds.

Another source for legal MP3s and WMAs is from music download ser-vices on the Internet, like MSN Music. In Windows Media Player 10 there is a direct link to MSN Music in the menu bar. From these music sites, you have access to over 2 million songs from all genres, to download on to your digital music player.

Safeguard your identity …

This e-mail was provided by a mem-

ber who received it. -- Editor A corporate attorney sent the follow-

ing out to the employees in his com-pany.

1. The next time you order checks have only your initials (instead of first name) and last name put on them. If someone takes your checkbook they will not know if you sign your checks with just your initials or your first name, but your bank will know how you sign your checks.

2. Do not sign the back of your credit cards. Instead, put “PHOTO ID REQUIRED.”

3. When you are writing checks to pay on your credit card accounts do not put the complete account number on the “For” line. Instead, just put the last four numbers. The credit card company knows the rest of the number, and any-one who might be handling your check as it passes through all the check proc-essing channels won’t have access to it.

4.Put your work phone number on your checks instead of your home phone. If you have a post office box, use that instead of your home address. If you do not have a post office box, use your work address.

Never have your Social Security number printed on your checks. (DUH!) You can add it if it is necessary. But if you have it printed, anyone can get it.

5. Place the contents of your wallet on a photocopy machine. Do both sides of each 1icense, credit card, etc. You w1ll know what you had in your wallet

and all of the account numbers and phone numbers to call and cancel. Keep the photocopy in a safe place.

I also carry a photocopy of my pass-port when I travel either here or abroad. We’ve all heard horror stories about fraud that’s committed on us in stealing a name, address, Social Security num-ber, credit cards. Unfortunately, I, an attorney, have firsthand knowledge be-cause my wallet was stolen last month. Within a week, the thieve(s) ordered an expensive monthly cell phone package, applied for a Visa credit card, had a credit line approved to buy a Gateway computer, received a PIN umber from DMV to change my driving record in-formation online, and more. But here’s some critical information to limit the damage in case this happens to you or someone you know:

1. We have been told we should can-cel our credit cards immediately. But the key is having the toll-free numbers and your card numbers handy so you know whom to call. Keep those where you can find them.

2. Fi1e a police report immediately in the jurisdiction where your credit cards, etc., were stolen. This proves to credit providers you were diligent, and this is a first step toward an investiga-tion (if there ever is one).

But here’s what is perhaps most im-portant of all (I never even thought to do this.)

3. Call the three national credit re-porting organizations immediately to



By Rick Smith [email protected]

It all started when the Sony Vaio laptop came in for repairs. None of the fixes worked, so we backed up the data and wiped the hard drive in preparation for reinstalling Windows 98. Called the

customer to get the restore disk. “Hmm. Not sure if we still have it. Call you back.” A couple of hours later: “No luck. Must have lost it in the move.” We can get the drivers off the Internet and use a standard Win98 disk, but it takes longer and costs a bit more. No prob-

lem. Except that there are no Win98 driv-

ers on the Sony Web site. A call to tech support produced, “Install Windows XP or buy the Win98 restore disk.” By the time we upgraded the RAM and pur-chased WinXP, we’d have spent more than the computer was worth, so we decided to purchase the disk from Sony for $15 — except they were out of stock and weren’t planning on making any more. Several Compaq laptops used the same sound chips, so we were able to get those from Compaq, but for other hardware we were unable to determine the chips used or find drivers. The client has to either pay for an upgrade to XP or throw an otherwise perfectly good lap-top away. How does Sony get away with it? Why isn’t someone warning every-one NOT to buy Sony laptops? Their support has been nonexistent for ages, but this is beyond all reason.

At the shop, this set us off on all the proprietary junk that major manufactur-

ers put into their computers so their cus-tomers have to get them repaired from authorized vendors using authorized parts. Sony is the worst offender, but Dell isn’t far behind. It is difficult-to-impossible to find some of their drivers, too. Hewlett Packard/Compaq tends to have more accessible drivers, but their hardware is sometimes proprietary.

There was the customer who brought in his brand new Dell. He hadn’t real-ized it didn’t come with a floppy drive when he ordered it online. Could we install one? Sure. Floppies are cheap, and it only takes a second. Except on a Dell. The mounting brackets are non-standard and you have to order them from Dell. For $35. For a cheap, plastic bracket. You can’t even mount a Zip drive or camera card reader without the bracket. Comment as the client was leaving: “It would have been cheaper just to buy it from you guys to start with.”

Or there was the Hewlett Packard that needed a new power supply. No problem. Except they mounted it upside down from standard, and the air flow was all wrong. Another customer had purchased an inexpensive Hewlett Pack-ard at a local electronics retailer. When the power supply went out while still under warranty, she called HP tech sup-port for a replacement. The tech asked her how she was using the computer. When she said that it was on all day, five or six days a week, the tech said: “That machine isn't designed for that workload. The power supply is designed for occasional use in evenings and on weekends.” Didn’t say it on the box.

There is a reason for industry stan-dards. You can get replacement parts

anywhere, anytime. Large manufactur-ers like to lock customers into their sys-tem, making sure they buy replacement parts only through the manufacturer and installed only by authorized dealers. There is no money in manufacturing computers. Prices are so low that unless you get add-on business, you go out of business. Hence the predatory practices. A year ago Michael Dell was bragging that Dell earned 110 percent of the in-dustry’s profit — which means he was the only one profitable. It has gotten worse since.

For companies that buy new com-puters on a schedule, it isn’t too much of a problem. You buy the onsite service contract and forget about it. For users at home or in small offices, it is a different story. They tend to keep computers longer and single-computer service con-tracts are expensive. If you are a hobby-ist and like to fiddle with the innards of your computer, you may well be disap-pointed. Stuff you buy at the computer show may well not work inside a pro-prietary machine.

Despite all the attention given to the large manufacturers, the majority of all PCs are industry standard units sold through local computer retailers. Their initial prices are higher, but their service is better, and you aren’t tied into them forever. As major manufacturers cut prices even further and sell through vol-ume retailers with no computer exper-tise, we will see a more distinct two-tier pricing scheme. If you want a standard computer with support, you’ll pay more initially. If you want the cheapest initial cost, you’ll lock yourself into a proprie-tary solution with no local support. That time is coming, if it isn’t here already.

SMITH

Rick's rants

Proprietary hardware complicates repairs

place a fraud alert on your name and Social Security number. I had never heard of doing that until advised by a bank that called to tell me an applica-tion for credit was made over the Inter-

net in my name. The alert means any company that

checks your credit knows your infor-mation was stolen, and they have to contact you by phone to authorize new credit. By the time I was advised to do

this, almost two weeks after the theft, all the damage had been done.

There are records of all the credit checks initiated by the thieves’ pur-chases, none of which I knew about



More on bits and bytes ...


Have you voted on the acceptance of the new bylaws? If not, you can go on the club’s Web page and check out the changes that the board has recom-mended. Art Lewis has put many hours

into this project and has come up with several changes that will make the club work more effi-ciently. A brief descrip-tion of the changes being considered appears on

page 16. Be sure to read it if you haven’t already.

Also, while you are on the Web site, check out the “List Sign-up” at the bot-tom of the “Latest Revisions” column. There are two lists to be aware of. The first one is the SIG Sign-up List, and many of you are already signed up for that one. The other one is a list that David will send out the last week before the meeting letting everyone know what the program is and any important issues that will be coming up during the meet-ing. At the moment, the “Be Notified” sign-up is also appearing in the second

paragraph of the front page. When you access the link, it will give you a choice of which list to sign up for.

If you want to be on both lists and are not currently signed up for the SIG list, you need to do them one at a time because the responses go to separate directories.

If you are currently signed up for the SIG list. it is not necessary to do it again. If you change your e-mail ad-

dress, be sure to sign up with your new address, but this does not go to Ken Church, so be sure to let Ken know of any e-mail address change.

Be sure to check out the new pic-tures posted for 2005. They are under new headers “BTS 2005” and “Meeting 2005.” I will try to keep the pictures in the proper size so they will print prop-erly as well as display properly. Look at them now while the file size is small — they won’t take as much time to download.

I can not stress enough the impor-tance of keeping your antivirus program up to date and running Ad-Aware and SpyBot frequently to keep the spyware to a minimum. You would be amazed at out how these things can slow your computer down.

Also, you might want to try Firefox as your browser instead of MSIE. I really like it, and I swear the spy junk does not collect as much on Firefox as it does on MSIE. There is a link from our Web site for this free software, so try it out.

LONG

Society news: Web page Vote on bylaws, sign up for meeting notices

The Penguin’s Lair

Saving files and settings in Knoppix By Bill Wayson [email protected]

In my January 2005 TOE column, I discussed Knoppix, a feature-packed distribution of Linux that runs com-pletely from a CD while touching noth-ing on your PC’s drives unless you give your permission to do so. This feature allows you to experiment with and learn about Linux and Open Source Software (OSS) without any fear of changing or harming the finely tuned operating sys-tem and software that is already on your PC. When you shut Knoppix down, your PC is left in the same exact state it was in before you ran Knoppix. This feature also means that you have to re-configure system- and user-specific set-

tings each and every time you run Knoppix, settings like your printer or modem, and personal settings like the background wallpaper and window decorations. It also makes it hard to save files. They can’t be saved to the Knop-pix CD, and all of the other storage in your PC is read-only. Obviously this greatly hinders your ability to really see how Linux and the OSS included on the Knoppix CD works. Well, one of the purposes of Knoppix is to get you using Linux and OSS, so Klaus Knopper and the other developers of Knoppix provide a simple way to save your personaliza-tion of Knoppix as well as files such as those downloaded from the Internet or those you create. In keeping with the “do not touch” philosophy of Knoppix,

you are in complete control of where this saving is done. Note: I am using the Knoppix 3.7 CD for this column.

Before configuring this persistent files and settings capability, it is impor-tant to understand exactly what can be saved. Once you do, you can decide what it is you want to save and perform the appropriate configuration in Knop-pix. By “saved” I mean that the files you create or download and settings you change will remain and be available even after the computer is shut down and powered off. Using any current computer system, there are three catego-ries of information that you, the user, may want to save: files, personal set-tings, and system settings. Files are



pretty self explanatory: They are things like documents you work on, e-mail you receive, and things you download from the Internet. The distinction between personal and system settings is impor-tant. As most users of a multi-user oper-ating system, such as Linux, UNIX be-fore it, and Windows NT, 2000, and XP know, individuals can be given their own separate login or account on a sin-gle computer. This separation of users allows each person to customize his or her own computing experience. Each can have, say, his own desktop decora-tions (such as the background wallpa-per, colors, screensaver, etc.) without affecting the customizations of others who are using the same computer. These user-level changes are “personal settings” since they are specific to a single user account or login. Addition-ally, there are things that are specific to the computer itself but common to all the users of that computer. For example, the computer undoubtedly has a video card and monitor, probably has a printer

attached to it, and maybe a modem of some sort. Devices such as these need to be configured before they are used (though most modern operating systems will usually do so pretty automatically). These configurations comprise the com-puter’s “system settings.” Decide which of these categories you want to save because it will affect how you configure Knoppix. It is quite all right to decide to save all three.

Knoppix provides facilities to create and use two persistent instances of in-formation: your Knoppix configuration and your Knoppix home directory. Sav-ing your Knoppix configurations will save (at your option) your personal set-tings and your system settings. Saving your Knoppix home d i rec tory (“Knoppix” is the default user account when running the Knoppix CD) also saves your personal settings (since these are saved in the user’s home directory) as well as any files you have placed in your home directory. System settings are not saved because they are not part of any user’s home directory. If you

want to save files, personal, and system settings, then save your Knoppix con-figuration and create a persistent Knop-pix home directory.

First, consider where you want to save your information. Knoppix can save only to media that are present at the time Knoppix boots (except for floppy disks, which can be inserted and removed after Knoppix is running). That means if you want to save to a Zip drive, a USB-connected drive, or a Fire wire -connected drive, it must be plugged in and powered up, if neces-sary, from the time you reach the first Knoppix boot menu. Knoppix recog-nizes these during the boot process. Second, consider the amount of infor-mation you want to save. The Knoppix configuration can be saved to a floppy disk as long as your changes to the Knoppix defaults are very minimal. It took me just minutes to exceed the ca-pacity of a floppy disk. On the other hand, 10 to 20 MB should be more than adequate to save even the most custom-



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ized configurations. The Knoppix home directory is another matter. The default Knoppix home directory is too large to fit on a standard floppy disk. It can grow quite large, especially if you are going to save a lot of files in the Knop-pix home. If saving files is your goal, then you probably cannot have too much space. Third, consider what you are going to do with Knoppix and your saved information. If you will run Knoppix only on a single computer, you can use one of the PC’s internal hard disks. If you want to take Knoppix with you and use it, as you have cus-tomized it, on multiple computers, you will want to use a portable medium such as a USB flash drive.

At this point, you should be ready to configure Knoppix to make use of your persistent information. Turn your PC on (or reboot it) and insert the Knoppix CD. When the first Knoppix splash screen comes up (the screen will show “boot:” at the bottom left), press a key to pause the boot process. If your me-dium to save on is external, plug it in now and power it on if necessary. At this point, you can press Enter to con-tinue the boot process. If you boot Knoppix with specific boot parameters and you want to save to a USB device, make sure you boot the default 2.4 ker-nel. Do not boot the Knoppix 2.6 ker-nel. The configuration- and home -saving scripts on the Knoppix 3.7 CD do not properly recognize USB devices under the 2.6 kernel, although Knoppix itself does under the 2.6 kernel. If your PC was recently manufactured, you may want to try the “usb2” and “dma” boot parameters as they could noticea-bly speed things up.

Once Knoppix is up and running, you should see icons for all the media that Knoppix recognized. Internal hard disks are hd* (if IDE) or sd* (if SCSI). Zip disks should be named similar to sda4. USB drives should be similar to sdb1. Double click the icons and exam-ine the contents to be sure what each icon name identifies. Now decide what you want to save first. Open up the

Knoppix menu (it is under the penguin icon on the panel at the bottom of the screen) and select the Configure menu item. Under Configure, you will see “Create a persistent KNOPPIX home directory” and “Save KNOPPIX con-figuration.” We will do both.

Selecting “Create a persistent KNOPPIX home directory” brings up an information screen describing what you are about to do and how to make use of it. Pressing the “Yes” button brings up a list of all the media Knop-pix recognizes, which it can write to (for instance, Knoppix cannot write to NTFS formatted disk partitions), and which have enough capacity (you won’t see your floppy disk). Note that the devices are listed with their Linux names (e.g. the Windows C: drive may appear as /dev/hda1). Select the device you wish to save the Knoppix home directory to and press the “OK” button. Next, you are asked if you want to use the entire partition (which may be the entire device) or create an image of the Knoppix home directory. Selecting “Yes” to use the entire partition will cause it to be reformatted as a Linux file system. Doing so will erase any data on the partition and render it use-less under Windows since Windows will not recognize the file system. Se-lecting “No” (to create a home direc-tory image) will create a file on part of the device which, under Knoppix will be used just like a disk partition, and under Windows will appear like a file called knoppix.img, along with any other files that may be on the device. Be careful not to delete knoppix.img

under Windows. We will select “No.” Next, you are told how much space

on the medium is used, how much is available, and asked how much you wish to use for the Knoppix home di-rectory. You can use up to the full amount available. Enter the size in megabytes that you wish to allocate to the Knoppix home directory, remem-bering to err on the side of making it too big rather than too small. Press the “OK” button. Knoppix now prepares a Linux file system inside the knop-pix.img file. Patience is a virtue at this point since the progress meter will seemingly stall at 97 percent for a while.

Once the file system preparation is done, you are asked if you want to en-crypt the home directory. The encryp-tion is quite strong, so everything in the Knoppix home directory will be well- protected from prying eyes. But you will be required to type in “a very long password” whenever you boot Knop-pix, so balance this inconvenience with the sensitivity of the information that will be saved in the Knoppix home. We’ll say “No.”

At this point, the new Knoppix home directory/file is formatted, and the contents of the current home direc-tory are copied into it. Upon comple-tion, you are presented with a “success” dialog box along with instructions on how to use your newly created home directory. At this point, it is probably a good idea to reboot Knoppix to make use of your persistent home directory before making any changes to your personal settings (after all, you proba-bly want to save them). After rebooting and at the “boot:” prompt of the first Knoppix splash screen, enter in “knoppix home=scan” (along with any other boot parameters you desire) to make use of the persistent home. Once Knoppix is up and running, your home directory will be on your writable me-dium, and any changes to your personal settings will be automatically saved.

Now you may wish to change and save some configuration settings. To



More on Penguin’s Lair ...

“Selecting ‘Create a persistent

KNOPPIX home directory’

brings up an information screen

describing what you are about to

do and how to make use of it.”


save them, go to the Configure item under the Knoppix menu and select “Save KNOPPIX configuration.” Up will come a dialog box with five selection boxes that allow you to choose which types of settings to save. If you’ve made a persistent home directory, you probably do not need to se-lect the “Personal configuration” item since those settings are saved in the persistent home. Otherwise, do select that. The next item, “All files on the Desktop,” allows you to play a little creative trickery. You could save files to your desktop, then save this item in the configuration to save those files. But I’d recommend leaving this item at its de-fault unselected state and using the persistent home strategy to save files. If you are likely to use this configuration again on the same computer, go ahead and leave the “Network settings,” “Graphics subsystem settings,” and “Other system configuration” items selected. When you’ve made your se-lections, press the “OK” button. Again you are asked where you want to save the configuration (you should see the floppy drive if your PC has one along with other recognized media). Select the device and press “OK.” Knoppix now saves the configuration as a single file (configs.tbz) along with a Linux script (knoppix.sh) which will be run at boot time to extract the saved configuration. Again, these files are quite visible from Windows, so be careful not to delete them.

Unlike creating a persistent home directory, which is done once then simply used from then on, the configuration should be saved every time you make a change to your per-sonal (if there is no persistent home directory) or system settings that you want to keep. As long as you consistently select the configuration items that you want to save, particu-larly right before you shut Knoppix down, it does no harm to save a Knoppix configuration over the top of an old saved configuration (other than possibly saving a misconfigura-tion).

At any point you can configure Knoppix to your liking, changing your desktop or setting up a printer, modem, or network card. Just remember to save the configuration be-


fore you shut Knoppix down. To use your saved configura-tion, use the “myconf=scan” (or the equivalent “config=scan”) boot parameter at the first Knoppix splash screen. Knoppix will then restore your configuration to the state it was in when you last saved it. If you have created both a persistent home directory and saved your Knoppix configu-ration, your boot command will be something like “knoppix home=scan myconf=scan” (plus any other desired boot pa-rameters). This will allow you the maximum flexibility of saving files, personal settings, and system settings.

At the time this column was written (early April 2005) the latest Knoppix CD was version 3.7. But Knoppix 3.8 has been announced and is “days” away from being available for download. Knoppix 3.8 promises some significant enhance-ments and changes from 3.7, so we will probably explore 3.8 over the next few months. The instructions here are specific to the 3.7 version of Knoppix.

I hope I have shown how simple it is to save files and personalization of Knoppix. This should make it easier for you to explore the power of Linux and OSS using Knoppix. However, I do not recommend Knoppix for regular, day-to-day computing using Linux and OSS — this is not what Knoppix was designed for, and I wouldn’t do it myself. While it is possible to install Knoppix to a hard drive and run it from there, it is not straightforward nor is it representative of how simple it is to install Linux on modern PC hardware, either as a standalone operating system or alongside Win-dows. Installing new software under Knoppix is also prob-lematic.

In short, when you start to see yourself using Linux and OSS for your ongoing computing needs, it is time to consider which distribution of Linux you want to learn and install it. Your life will be so much easier if you do. If all goes well, you will be able to see an actual installation of Linux when we install it on the CIPCUG computer at Ventura County Computers at the Linux SIG meeting on April 28. See the Web site for more details. And if there are any Linux users out there who have recognized the many places in this col-umn where I cut corners and was not absolutely accurate (there are many ways to do things under Knoppix and Linux), we’d like to see you at the SIG.

Until May, happy computing.

More on Penguin’s lair ...

before placing the alert. Since then, no additional damage has been done, and the thieves threw my wallet away this weekend (someone turned it in). It seems to have stopped them dead in their tracks.

Now, here are the numbers you always need to contact about your wallet, etc., being stolen: 1. Equifax: 1-800-525-6285 2. Experian (formerly TRW): 1-888-397-3742 3. Trans Union: 1-800-680-7298 4. Social Security Administration (fraud line): 1-800-269-0271


More on bits and bytes ...


Ken Church Martha Churchyard Jerry Crocker David Harris Larry Hudson Kim Komando Art Lewis Helen Long Stan Ranson Smart Computing

Rick Smith Bill Wayson John Weigle

Many of the changes proposed for the CIPCUG bylaws are housekeeping, but some do make substantive changes to the group’s organization and practices. Here’s a summary of the major changes prepared from the material on the CIPCUG Web page.

Article 3: Directors — The Board of Directors increases from five members to nine members. The members of the expanded board would be president, vice-president, secre-tary, treasurer, immediate past president, membership chair, SIG chair, Web/ISP chair and technical adviser.

A provision would be added to prohibit the president from serving consecutive terms. The term of office — two years — would not change.

A provision of the bylaws that would not change (Section 3.6 of Article 3) would result in some positions that are now appointed becoming elected positions because it requires that all directors must be elected.

The quorum for the Board of Directors would change from the present three members to five members.

Article 4 — Officers: The immediate past president would become an officer. The officers (president, vice president, secretary, immediate past president and chief financial officer) would be renamed the Executive Commit-tee of the Board of Directors.

The president, as indicated earlier, could not serve con-secutive terms. The immediate past president’s term would also be two years.

Article 6 — Execution of instrument, deposits and funds: Checks for more than $1,000 (the current figure is $500) would have to be countersigned by the president (in addition to the treasurer).

Tips from Smart Computing magazine

Here’s a summary of major proposals in the bylaws revision

Reprinted with permission from Smart Computing. Visi t ht tp: / /www.smartcomputing.com/groups to learn what Smart Computing can do for you and your user group. — Editor

Avoid Dust On Your PDA Screen:

Thanks to static electricity, your PDA screen will attract inordinate amounts of dust in a short period of time. To reduce the amount of dust on your screen, wipe it with a static-cling control sheet that you already sent through the dryer with a load of laundry.

Should I Let Windows XP Report Errors To Microsoft? In WinXP, Win-dows offers to report any errors directly to Microsoft anytime an error occurs. This may or may not be helpful, de-pending on the situation. Regardless,

due to privacy concerns, error reports are completely anonymous, and only a handful of Microsoft developers have access to these error reports. Don’t ex-pect Microsoft to get back to you con-cerning an error report. Microsoft devel-opers, however, may notice trends in submitted reports over time. They can use this information in the future to fix common errors. Remember, the infor-mation you submit in these reports is confidential. If you do contact Micro-soft’s tech support department directly, the techs will not have access to the report you submitted. Dr. Watson logs, therefore, are still useful when contact-ing Microsoft’s tech support department even if you’ve filed an automatic error report.

How To Use A Search Engine:

Most search engine users type two- or three-word phrases, and that can be good enough most of the time. But too often, these simple phrase searches yield thousands and thousands of hits — way too many to effectively sort. So familiarize yourself with the advanced search options of your favorite search engine. Don’t let the word “advanced” scare you off: You can learn your way around these search functions in min-utes. Just read the help provided by your search site.

For instance, on Google you can search for an exact phrase by putting it in quotes, limit hits to a particular lan-guage, or just show pages that have been recently updated. (Details about advanced searching on Google are at www.google.com/advanced_search.).

2005 contributors to The Outer Edge Your name can appear here, too. Share your knowledge

with other members by sending an article, letter or com-puter tip to [email protected].

Article 12 — Members. Application fees and dues would be set by the Board of Directors rather than being specified in the bylaws. They would have to be approved by the membership, published in TOE and listed on the Web site.

A new section on guests reads as follows: “Guests are welcome to attend the regular meeting of the club for up to two meetings. Guests wishing to attend additional meetings must pay the membership fee and join the club.”

Article 13 — Meetings of members: The annual meet-ing would be moved from June to May.

Provisions for an electronic ballot would be added. The quorum for the membership meetings would

change from one-third to one-fifth of the membership.


Membership report: Is it time to renew?

By Ken Church E-mail address: [email protected] Welcome to the following new members: Caroline Corser, Geoff Debrito, John and Pongpan Hargett Attendance at the February 2005 general meeting: 85 Members 8 Guests

Total membership: 309

RENEWAL INFORMATION The renewal/New Mbr dues are $25/$35 for single membership, $30/$50 for two or more family membership. Please send your renewal payment to:

CIPCUG MEMBERSHIP P.O. BOX 51354 OXNARD, CA 93031-1354

Or bring your payment to the March meeting at the Boys and Girls Club of Camarillo. January 2005 renewals:

February 2005 renewals:

February 2005 renewals: (continued)

March 2005 renewals:

Hope to see you at the next meeting.

Mbr# Last Name First Name Pd to Date 0835 Brown George 200501 0956 Buford Don 200501 0654 Cayou Mylo 200501 0548 De Magri Oscoe 200501 0088 Gandin Dr. Morris 200501 0753 Otterson Dick 200501 1088 Scheer Ted 200501 1135 Sherbrooke Rosalie 200501 1134 Stanton John 200501

Mbr# Last Name First Name Pd to Date 0299 Boshoff Henri 200502 0180 Daily John 200502 1129 Escobedo Ray 200502 1063 Field Dwayne 200502 1063A Field Sharon 200502

Mbr# Last Name First Name Pd to Date 0862 Horwald Jacqueline 200502 0395 Horwald, MD Sylvan H. 200502 1139 Lardin Shawne 200502 0851 Malloy Gene 200502 0566 Meeker Kirsten 200502 0565 Meeker Mary 200502 1141 Meler John 200502 0656T Mori Ken 200502 1047 Norton Henry 200502 1054 Wasserman Harold 200502 1055 Wasserman Jan 200502 1140 Wayson Bill 200502 1050 Wennerholm Ernest 200502 1051 Wennerholm Naomi 200502

Mbr# Last Name First Name Pd to Date 1060 Bailey Carl 200503 1003 Casey Richard 200503 1056 Dayman Bain 200503 1057 Dayman Evelyn 200503 0669 De Wolfe Terry 200503 0667 Dirrim Allen 200503 0054T Erickson Elden 200503 1016 Falconer Margaret 200503 0917 Johnson Barbara 200503 1142 Johnson Ginny 200503 0138 Lakes Arline 200503 0137 Lakes George 200503 0425 Ledner, MD Bob 200503 0757 MacArthur James 200503 1014 Marcovitz Morton 200503 0100 McLoud Jerry 200503 1144 Mortensen Diane 200503 0571 Swingle Phil 200503 0936 Teitzell Leonard 200503 1090 True Ed 200503 0430 Volpe Victor 200503 1143 Wiggins Stephen 200503 1013 Willson Marty 200503 1012 Yates Jeff 200503 0771 Zuromski Alexandra 200503


F1—Your Help Key (Revised Nov. 26, 2004)

COMMUNICATIONS/INTERNET (GENERAL) Compuserve DM Note Tab Pro TS World Wide Web DM, TS

DATABASES Access BR DOS RP

EDUCATIONAL / CHILDREN TZ

E-MAIL Eudora JT Outlook TS, AT, MS Outlook Express TS, AT, BR Poco Email MS

HARDWARE, UPGRADING JM

HTML TS, AT

NETWORKS TS

OFFICE SUITES MS Office AT Open Office AT Star Office AT GRAHICS PROGRAMS IrfanView MS, JT Print Shop BR

SPREADSHEETS Microsoft Excel DM, AT Quattro Pro DM

UTILITY PROGRAMS Norton Utilities DM, JT (and Anti-Virus) PCAnywhere DM

WORD PROCESSING Microsoft Word BW, DM WordPerfect. DM WINDOWS Windows 98, 95 DM, JM, AT (98), MS (98) Windows Me JT, AT Windows 2000 TS, AT Windows NT TS

Initials Name (805) AT Andy Toth 604-7538 (e) BR Bill Robinson 389-2997 (b) <[email protected]> BW Bart Wood 482-4993 (e) DM David Minkin 469-6970 (cell); 484-2974 (home); [email protected] or [email protected] JM Jerry McLoud (818) 889-6176 (e) JT Jim Thornton 987-1748 (d) <[email protected]> MS Michael Shalkey 483-9921 ext 142 (d) [email protected] RP Robert Provart 498-8477 (b) TS Toby Scott 289-3960 (d) [email protected] TZ Trish Zakas 985-8519 (b) Phone: (d) = days; (e) = evenings; (b) = both If you would like to volunteer to help others, please send your contact information and programs you’re willing to help on to <[email protected]>. Also, if you have a favorite help site on the Web, please forward that, too, so we can make a separate sec-tion for Web-based help.

Practice safe computing: Back up

Back up Back up

(And then test the backup to be sure it worked)


Every month, members of the Channel Islands PC Users Group have access to:

♦ The Outer Edge newsletter, which includes a list of members willing to help other members

♦ The general meeting, featuring a question-and-answer session and program on new software or hardware

♦ Special Interest Groups — special meetings held several times a month on a variety of topics

♦ Door prizes at the regular meeting.

♦ The CIPCUG library of books and videos.

Other benefits include: ♦ Special user group discounts on

books and software ♦ An Internet Service Provider at

a large discount (see below). ♦ A chance to make friends with

people who have similar interests

♦ The abil i ty to put your knowledge to good use by helping other members. The whole concept of user groups is members helping members.

CIPCUG members are eligible to sign up for the group’s Internet Service Provider (ISP) at the low price of only $15 per month plus a $15 processing fee.

To sign up, contact one of the club’s techies (see below). Call one of them you may know or one in your area and they will be glad to provide you with the

details necessary for signing up. Checks should be made payable to CIPCUG and forwarded to Treasurer, c/o CIPCUG, P. O. Box 51354, Oxnard CA 93031. Don’t forget to include the $15 set-up fee in your first sign-up check. You may make payments in three-month, six-month or annual increments. We also give a 12-month subscription if prepaid in advance at the 11-month price of $165. Many of our club members are electing to do this to keep Helen from nagging them for money. Renewals can also be mailed to Treasurer; just be sure to mention the dates that your check is to cover.

There is no program to install; you will use programs that are already on your computer. It’s simple to talk you through the set-up, but if you’re the least bit timid about setting up your computer, a club member will come to your house and make the necessary arrangements. Our agreement will also give you a 5 MB Web page allowance.

_________________________

CIPCUG INTERNET SERVICE TECH TEAM

Helen Long, 642-6521 [email protected] David Minkin, 469-6970 (cell), 484- 2974 (home) [email protected] Bob Thompson - 647-2287 [email protected] ______________________________ Please clip last column and send with payment to CIPCUG-Membership, P.O. Box 51354, Oxnard, CA 93031-1354. Please make checks payable to CIPCUG

Dues for new members

Individual member, $35. Family membership (same address), $50. Renewals are $25 and $30 per year respectively

CIPCUG MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION

Amount enclosed: ____________________________ Please Print the following information: Name: _______________________________ Address: _______________________________ City: ___________________________, CA ZIP Code: _______________________________ Phone no. (Home): _______________ (Work): _______________________ E-mail address: _______________________________ User level: Novice _____; Intermediate _____; Advanced _____ Can you help the club as a volunteer? If so, what would you be interested in working on? Date ___________________ Member # ____________

Why join Channel Islands PC Users Group (CIPCUG)?


Channel Islands PC Users Group Inc. P.O.Box 51354 Oxnard, CA. 93031

DATED MATERIAL Please Do Not Delay

NON-PROFIT U.S. POSTAGE

PAID OXNARD. CA

PERMIT NO. 1785

April 2005April 2005 M Meetingeeting Of the Channel Islands PC Users Group Of the Channel Islands PC Users Group

Saturday morning, April 23, at Boys & Girls Club,

Ponderosa Drive and Temple Avenue, Camarillo, Calif.

Meeting Schedule: 8:30 a.m. Doors open 8:45-9:30 Beginners SIG, Internet SIG 9:30-10:30 Business meeting, Q&A 10:30-11:00 Break — Please contribute requested amounts for coffee and doughnuts 11:00-12:00 Program (The Digital Photo Guy), Drawing 12:30 p.m. SIG at Round Table Pizza in Camarillo

DUES REMINDER If the number after your name is 0504, your membership dues are payable in April 2005.

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Documents

The Outer E Newsletter of the Channel Islands PC Users Group d