Please visit the
LangaList Home Page
Please Note: Archived information (e.g. below) may become out
of date.
How
To Subscribe and Unsubscribe is at the end of this note.
Mailing List Trouble? See http://www.langa.com/help.txt
Want an easier-to-read formatted HTML version? See http://www.langa.com/whats_new.htm
Advertising rates and info available at http://www.langa.com/rate_card.html
Please
email the LangaList to a friend! (Use this super-fast
form !)
The
LangaList
26-Aug-99
A Free Email
Newsletter from Fred Langa About BrowserTune,
HotSpots, Columns, Tips & Tricks, and Other Activities
In This Issue:
MS Office Security Problem
MS Office/FrontPage/Netscape Problem
BT2K Update
Hard Drive Disks The Size of a Tire
The "Microsoft Tax"
Your Opinion, Please?
Was EasyMTU Hard For You To Get?
Spread the Word! Win a Palm III! (Maybe...)
Just For Grins
More!
If you're using Microsoft Office 97
or MS Office 2000, or more specifically, Excel 97 or 2000, there's a security
problem: According to Microsoft, " a malicious coder could create a...
spreadsheet that exploits a vulnerability in [the] database driver to delete
files and perform other malicious acts. A user could encounter this
problem by opening a spreadsheet attached to an e-mail message or linked from a
Web site."
It also could be an issue in
offices where spreadsheet files may be shared directly.
Oddly, this new problem arose
during testing to solve an entirely separate "ODBC Driver
Vulnerability" that Microsoft found out about last month. If you know about
that issue, be aware that the issue I'm talking about here is a new and separate
problem.
Microsoft has bundled both fixes
in a single patch that is available via http://officeupdate.microsoft.com/Articles/mdac_typ.htm
If you're running Office/Excel
97/2000, you should click over and follow the instruction there. If you run into
trouble try this page for assistance: http://officeupdate.microsoft.com/Articles/ousupport.htm
return
to top of page
--------------(
Please Visit This LangaList Sponsor!) ------------
--------------(
the above is a paid advertisement )--------------
I'm just about caught up with the
thousands of emails that accumulated during my week off. Just before vacation I
got a new PC (more on that in an upcoming issue). I took the opportunity of
starting fresh with the new PC to finish my switchover to Office2000, including
FrontPage2000.
Like all software, FrontPage is
imperfect: Its editor has always been funky, and the site management tools are
slow on large sites. But on the whole, I've never found a better tool for
quickly assembling sites and pages. I've been creating the HTML version of the
LangaList with FrontPage97 for over a year. (The HTML version is available
online but not yet in email; you can view the HTML version by going to http://www.langa.com
and clicking on the "what's new" link.) For maximum compatibility with
all browsers, the HTML newsletter uses no advanced technologies---no scripts, no
DHTML, no stylesheets, etc.
By default, FrontPage2000 wants
to enable advanced features, but you can turn them off (and for the newsletter,
I did). It also has an explicit setting that allows you to create pages that are
backwards-compatible with both IE 3.0 and Navigator 3.0. Again striving for
maximum compatibility, I told FP2K to use that setting. And, unlike its
predecessors which were very aggressive about reformatting perfectly good HTML
to its own sometimes-odd standards, FP2K has a setting that tells the FP editor
NOT to diddle with your preexisting HTML. I selected that option, too.
So, in theory, to produce a
plain-vanilla HTML version of the newsletter, I'd disabled all of FP's advanced
features.
And that was fine--- until I
wanted to use Word2000's grammar checker on the newsletter. (FP has a spell
checker, but not a grammar checker.) Running the HTML newsletter through Word
added in a ton of MS Office-specific stuff that FP didn't strip out--- and that
caused Netscape Navigator to crash when users tried to use it to read the last
issue of the newsletter!
I suspect it's some DIV and SPAN
commands that Word inserted: DIV and SPAN are areas of well-known weaknesses in
the current versions of Navigator/Communicator. But still, I told FP not to use
any advanced features, and it obeyed, except when it came to handling
Word-generated code.
This is one of those
Rorschach-type problems where you'll see the villain depending on your world
view: You can legitimately blame Microsoft for not having better integration
between its Office components, but you also can blame AOL/Netscape for having
such a limited browser. (I know, I know, everything will be perfect when
Mozilla--- Netscape5--- finally ships. Riiiiiight. Just like the next version of
Office will be problem-free, too. <g>)
I think there's plenty of blame
to go around to both sides, and to me too for assuming that I was producing
plain-vanilla pages when I was not. My apologies to those readers whose
Netscape browsers had trouble with the HTML version of the last issue. This one
should be OK--- honest!
return
to top of page
I'm still working through the
test results you've shared and the comments and suggestions you sent me and
posted in the WinMag BBS area (at http://content.techweb.com/winmag//columns/fred/1999/0816.htm
), and I'm posting new updates to BT2K on a regular basis. If you haven't run
the beta in a while, please check out the home page to see when the current
version was posted: If it's newer than your last run, you may wish to give the
newer version a test drive!
FYI: The BT2K full beta is at http://www.browsertune.com/bt2k/
The BT2K demo (think of it as
"BT2K Lite") is still available at http://www.browsertune.com/bt2kdemo/
And the tried-and-true manual
version of BrowserTune (BT98) awaits you at http://www.browsertune.com/bt98/
return
to top of page
--------------(
Please Visit This LangaList Partner! )------------
--------------(
the above is an advertisement )-----------
It's true--- the first hard
drives stored only 5 megabytes in 50 platters, each 24 inches (roughly 600mm)
wide. The complete storage units were the size of a small refrigerator.
My column
this month for Byte explores the evolution of hard drive/magnetic storage
technology, and tells you about a stunning and brand-new discovery that may
allow a 1,000-fold increase in storage density in the future!
And this week’s
Byte discussion is ongoing: What’s next for mass storage? Do you think
magnetic media will remain dominant for the foreseeable future? Will rewritable
DVDs hasten the acceptance of high-capacity optical storage, or is optical
writing simply too slow? (Remember, magnetic writing was once slow, too.…)
Will cheap RAM prices offer the option for “diskless” PCs that use RAM for
swapfile storage and optical media for longer-term, less time-critical storage?
What’s your take on the future of hard drives?
Read the full
column and join in the ongoing discussion here: http://www.byte.com/column/monitor/BYT19990817S0025
!
And by the
way, the Byte discussion area offers you a choice of a web-based or a
newsgroup-based discussion. If you have a newsgroup reader (Outlook will do
nicely), choose that option as the web-based discussion area is decidedly funky
to read and use.
return
to top of page
The
discussion of Windows versions---including "Neptune,"
"Millennium" and "Janus," due out next year---has morphed
into a discussion on how to get a Windowsless PC, if you want to run a
non-Windows OS and don't want to pay what some call the "Microsoft
tax" that's built into the cost of many PCs. Interesting stuff.
Join in the ongoing discussion at http://www.informationweek.com/langaletter
!
return
to top of page
--------------(
Please Visit This LangaList Partner! )------------
--------------(
the above is an advertisement )-----------
The LangaList is
approaching two years old and I'm considering several major changes. The list is
growing phenomenally--- the subscriber base grows by some 10-20% *per month*---
so clearly many of you find the current format, frequency, etc. fine. But
everything can be made better, and this newsletter is no exception.
May I ask a small
favor? Can you spare about 5 minutes to answer a few questions that will help
directly shape the future of the LangaList? (I promise not to ask anything too
personal <g>)
If you'd like to
have your opinion counted please drop me a note at changesurvey@langa.com
. I appreciate your help, and look forward to working together to make this
newsletter---your newsletter---as good as it can be!
return
to top of page
In the last issue (see http://www.langa.com/newsletters/aug-23-99.htm#modem
), I told you about Rob Vonk's EasyMTU, a freeware applet that lets you tweak
your registry to significantly improve the throughput of a dial-up modem
connection. EasyMTU is available at http://members.tripod.com/~EasyMTU/
.
At least, it usually is--- Rob's
site was sporadically offline for a while right after the last newsletter went
out, which makes me believe so many of you visited the site it became
unreachable.
If you had trouble, try the
URL (above) again, or visit any of the major download sites. For example, visit http://www.tucows.com/
and put "easymtu" in the search box at the top of the page. It's that
easy!
Reader Bob Engelbardt also told
me about a similar freeware applet called iSpeed: It's available from http://www.hms.com/ispeed.htm
, and it does essentially the same thing as EasyMTU. It also lets you tweak
cable modem and DSL connections, although you'll have to know what you're doing
to accomplish this. (The program is set up so the default settings are optimal
for dial-up, not network connections; but they can be overridden.) A nice
feature of iSpeed is that it lets you automatically time FTP downloads so you
can change your settings, try a download to see the results, and then make
additional changes. iSpeed keeps a complete history of all your changes so if
you try something that reduces your throughput instead of increasing it, you can
get back to whatever your best-case settings were with just a click or two.
Nice! Thanks, Bob!
return
to top of page
-------------(
Please Visit This LangaList Partner! )------------
--------------(
the above is an advertisement )----------
If you think the LangaList is a
worthwhile read, just use the following link to recommend the LangaList to a
friend. Your friend just may find a new source of useful information; I just may
gain a new subscriber; and you just may win a Palm III organizer for your
trouble (full details also available via this link):
http://www.langa.com/recommend.htm#1
The "Recommend-It"
service is an ad-based site (you’ll see banners and such). The advantages to
you of using the Recommend-It service (above) are that you can win a Palm III
and that you can add a personal message to your LangaList recommendation.
But if you’d rather use the
tried-and-true, ad-free recommendation form, you’ll still find it at: http://www.langa.com/recommend.htm#2
. You can’t win anything there—except my thanks for helping the
LangaList to grow!
In fact, either way, thank you!
return
to top of page
Three thoughts for the day:
- Two wrongs don't make a
right, but three rights make a left.
- If swimming is so good
for your figure, how do you explain whales?
- I'd give my right arm
to be ambidextrous.
return
to top of page
See you next issue!
Best,
Fred
( fred@langa.com )
--------------(
your ad in the langalist?)------------
--------------(
)--------------
(P.S. Please email the
LangaList to a friend! Use this super-fast
form !)
LangaList advertising
rates and info available at http://www.langa.com/rate_card.html
An easier-to-read
formatted HTML version is available in the "what's new" section of http://www.langa.com
. All past LangaList issues are also available via the same link.
return
to top of page
Administrivia:
Why are you getting this newsletter? There are only two ways to get on the list
(direct email request or via the WinMag mail list signup page) so if you're
getting this newsletter; your name came to me through one of those
channels.
SUBSCRIBE (it's free!):
Send email to subscribe-langalist@lyris.dundee.net
UNSUBSCRIBE: Send email
to unsubscribe-langalist@lyris.dundee.net
LIST TROUBLE? CHANGE OF
ADDRESS? HAVE QUESTIONS? NEED HELP?
See http://www.langa.com/help.txt
This newsletter is a
free service of Langa Consulting LLC and is Copyright © 1999 Langa Consulting LLC. All
rights reserved.
return
to top of page |