Communications

Improving Your Wireless Security

October 16, 2008 By Terry Stockdale

If you’ve read some of my other articles about having an open, unsecured wireless network versus securing your wireless network so that others can not get into it, you know that I believe in security.

I recommend that everyone secure their wireless network to the extent possible. It’s impossible to completely secure a wireless system, but you can block out most users. You can make it difficult for others to use your network.

The point is to make the process hard enough that the visitor — the unauthorized person who is trying to use your network for normal Internet usage or illegal and/or immoral actions — decides to use someone else’s network.

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Filed Under: Communications, Networking, Security, Software, System, Terry's Computer Tips, Vista, Windows Updates, Windows XP

Setting Up Your Router

September 26, 2008 By Terry Stockdale

Setting up a router for your home network, or even to protect the one computer you are connecting to a cable modem or dsl modem, can be very straight forward. Most people will plug it in, turn on their computer and see everything works — and not even think about the manufacturer shipping it in an insecure mode so that startup is easy.

After you hook up your router and see that it works, there are some basic security settings that you need to change, whether you’re setting up a wireless router or a wired router.

The first thing to remember when setting up a wireless router is that you will have to connect one computer to the router via an Ethernet cable, at least initially and periodically.

You configure the router via the network. So far, so good. But, when you try to configure the router using a wireless connection…

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Anti-Spam Program Choices

July 29, 2008 By Terry Stockdale

Subscriber and long-time reader Scott Adler wrote to me about his experiences with three of the various anti-spam programs. I’ve used Mailwasher Pro and PopFile and like both, but they are entirely different in their approach to spam. My current choice is PopFile.

I’ve also mentioned iHateSpam, which is from the same company that offers my choice in anti-spyware and firewall programs; however, I don’t use iHateSpam because I don’t use Outlook Express or Outlook as my email program (I use Eudora).

The three anti-spam programs you speak about have quite different impact on ones PC.. I’ve been using I Hate Spam but it’s use brings a slowdown to the reaction of the computer. As the files of friends and enemies build up the computer runs slower and slower until it almost freezes up. That’s what happened to me and it took three days of agonizing trouble shooting before I recognized where the problem lay.

Continue reading Anti-Spam Program Choices

Products:

MailWasher Pro full-function 30-day trial
iHateSpam full-function 30-day trial
PopFile free

Filed Under: Anti-spam, Communications, Outlook, Outlook Express, Security, Shopping Deals, Software, Terry's Computer Tips

Emails and Spam Filters

June 17, 2008 By Terry Stockdale

Several people recently have had the emails, that they sent, fall victim to spam filters somewhere before getting to their recipients.

In one case of which I know, the email was sent to a mailing list. Many mailing list programs have filtering routines that are designed to block unwanted messages — not just blocking unsolicited commercial emails, but also blocking emails that appear to be help requests to the mailing list administrators.

Mailman, one of the more popular mailing list programs, does this kind of filtering so that all the list members don’t get the messages that appear aimed at the list owner. In particular, the filter is usually triggered by one- or two-word Subject lines in the email, especially if they have words like Help, Information, Info, Lists, Options, Remove, Unsubscribe and such.

So, what’s the fix? Don’t use a one- or two-word Subject line. Take the time to write a meaningful Subject.

Continue reading Emails and Spam Filters

Try the Full Version of iHateSpam for free for 30 days

Filed Under: Anti-spam, Communications, Email, Eudora, Opera, Outlook, Outlook Express, Security, Security Issues, Software, Terry's Computer Tips, Thunderbird

Outlook Express Links Don’t Work

December 21, 2007 By Terry Stockdale

I received an interesting question from subscriber Maria. She has been using Firefox, as many people do, including me. In this case, she had just upgraded her Internet Explorer to IE7 and was having problems with Outlook Express.

Maria wrote:

Terry, I currently have Fire Fox and Internet Explorer on my computer. I just added the Internet Explorer as a browser after removing it some time ago. Outlook Express is my default email handler. The problem is that in Outlook Express the links don’t open since I added Internet Explorer. [Tech guy] at [a local computer shop] says that it seams like the two are competing I am hoping that you have some ideas as I have tried a few from a Google search.

Fortunately for Maria, I had seen this problem before and thought I knew the answer.

Continue reading Outlook Express Links Don’t Work

Filed Under: Bug Fixes, Communications, Email, IE, Outlook Express, Patches, Pre-installed Software, Security Fixes, Software, System, Terry's Computer Tips, Usability, Web browsing

Inexpensive and Free Dialup Internet Service Providers

June 27, 2007 By Terry Stockdale

With AOL stepping back from the dialup market in the US, what’s left?In most areas, there are local phone companies and other local companies offering dialup services. You might be interested in them for multiple reasons, including supporting your local businesses. Some even have arrangements to use the large dialup networks that the large ISP’s use, too.

One local ISP in my area seems intent on raising its dialup prices until they drive off their customers. Strangely, it’s the same phone company that sells DSL service to most of Baton Rouge, so they aren’t endearing themselves to their potential DSL clients. Bellsouth obviously has some really bright marketing people, or some really clueless ones, since they think this will work…

Get a Free 10-hours-per-month Dialup Internet Account

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Filed Under: Communications, Terry's Computer Tips

Making Viewed Fonts and Images Larger (or smaller)

June 11, 2007 By Terry Stockdale

Ever go to a web site and find that the fonts are huge? Or, maybe they’re too small for your eyes?

Our favorite web browsers, whether we use Internet Explorer 6, IE7, Firefox 1.5, Firefox 2, Opera 8 or Opera 9, have multiple ways for us to change the size of the words we see.

Some of those ways affect only the text. They’ll let you have larger text or smaller text, but they won’t affect image sizes.

Some others will automatically change the displayed image size along with the displayed text characters.

Continue reading Making Viewed Fonts and Images Larger (or smaller)

Filed Under: Communications, Firefox, IE, Opera, Performance Tweaks, Terry's Computer Tips, Usability, Web browsing, Windows XP

Eudora to Become Open-Source

March 25, 2007 By Terry Stockdale

The final commercial version of my favorite email program Eudora was issued during the week of October 15, 2007. We finally got a new version, updating from v7.01 to 7.1.0.9.

There was another piece of good news — in plain sight — further down the web page at www.Eudora.com. Qualcomm, the phone manufacturer, has finally decided to release Eudora to the Open Source community!

Eudora is scheduled to become open source software, meaning anyone who wants can edit it and change it, in the first half of 2007.

Read more in Eudora to Become Open-Source

If you’re already using Eudora, and if you’re using it in “Sponsored Mode,” be sure to upgrade to the latest version before March 31st. On that date, the earlier versions of Sponsored Mode will become disabled.

Filed Under: Communications, Email, Eudora, Terry's Computer Tips

Review: GoToMyPC – Remote Access to Your PC

March 6, 2007 By Terry Stockdale

As I wrote in one of my weekly newsletters, I’de been trying the 30-day free trial of GoToMyPC. I’m very impressed with this service and its capabilities.

GoToMyPC is designed to allow a PC user to access his computer remotely. This user might be a salesman, a tech support person, a business man who left some files at the office (or at home), a traveler for business or pleasure. Access could be from across town or across the country.

Getting Started With GoToMyPC – 30-day free trial

On the remote PC, the PC that you’re actually using, you use a Java-capable web browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, etc) to access your host computer (your office or home PC). Any web browsers that supports Sun Microsystems’ Java (free, www.java.com) will work, although not all features may be available on some browsers. You can even access and control your Windows PC from a Mac.

Filed Under: Communications, Operating System, Remote Access, Web browsing, Windows XP

Why I Recommend Firefox…

February 18, 2007 By Terry Stockdale

I guess it’s been a long time since I’ve gotten on the Firefox versus Internet Explorer subject in my newsletter. For a while last year, I beat it to death…

But, recently, in responding to a reader’s question, I mentioned that I recommended Firefox over IE for web browsing. His response was “You Do?”

The reason that I recommend Firefox over Internet Explorer boils down to security while web surfing.

First, there’s the ActiveX issue.

ActiveX is a proprietary Microsoft technology that allows a web site to download a program to your computer via Internet Explorer — and to automatically run that program.