The LangaList

Fred's System Setup Secrets

Call me a slow learner. But over the years I've had to develop a series of defensive strategies to cope with the inevitable problems and hassles of hardware and software failure---especially because I test a lot of hardware and software, and regularly make my PCs blow up. (In a figurative sense, of course.)

I just bought a new PC--- my best guess is it's maybe the 30th machine I've used as my day-to-day personal system at work or at home. With each new machine I've used, I've tried various tricks and techniques and eventually developed a set routine that ensures that the system runs right from the start, stays right for as long as possible, and can be made right with minimum fuss when things inevitably go awry.

Many of these tips and tricks will work on any kind of system--- Mac, Linux, BeOS, etc.: Although the specifics I'll discuss below are for Windows machines, the ideas and concepts are easily transferable to other OSes.

And no matter what OS you run, some or all of these tips---learned the hard way from painful experience---may help you. Yes, a few of them may be overkill for normal users who don't abuse their PCs the way I do, but others are universal and can help anyone. Although the sequence of steps might seem daunting at first, it gets the awful, messy, grunt-work of system maintenance out of the way right away, and lets you reap the rewards of a stable-to-start, and easy-to-restore system for as long as you own it. Of course, the same techniques can be used on older systems too--- it's never too late to start fresh!

The actual step-by-step would more than fill this entire newsletter, so rather than send you a gigantic email, I made these system setup tips and tricks the basis of this week's Dialog Box on the WinMag BBS area; accessible from the front page of the WinMag site starting this afternoon (Aug 30, EDT, GMT-4): Go to http://content.techweb.com/winmag/ and look in the right hand column for the exact link to the column and discussion area.

The column will detail all the steps I take (and why I take them) so you can decide for yourself which ones might be useful to you, and which may be overkill. I'll be glad to answer whatever questions I can about the steps listed above, and I'd also love to hear from you: What tricks or techniques do you use? What tips can you share? What steps do you take to keep your system running smoothly?

Please check out the column and then join in the discussion via the front page of the WinMag site http://content.techweb.com/winmag/ starting this afternoon (Aug 30, EDT, GMT-4)!

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New Aug 30th BT2K Update

I've posted a new update to BT2K, and am working on what I hope will be the final steps to killing the last of the beta bugs. 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/

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HotSpots Sizzling

In the first item in this newsletter---about the Fast Shutdown Patch--- I mentioned how the patch site was featured in last week's HotSpots; HotSpots is another web site I run that features "Every Day, The Best, Most Interesting, Most Useful, and Strangest  Sites the Web has To Offer!"

This newsletter is twice-weekly, but the HotSpots site runs 365 times a year---a new site very day, without fail. As such, it's a great mechanism for me to highlight not only timelessly interesting or useful sites, but also brand-new, just-available sites--- such as the Fast Shutdown Patch Site. Regular HotSpots visitors were among the first to know of the release of the Shutdown Patch.

If you're not a regular Hotspots visitor, you're missing a lot. Check it out (every day!) at http://www.browsertune.com/flanga/hotspots.htm, and check out past HotSpots in the HotSpots Hall Of Fame at http://www.browsertune.com/flanga/hof.htm

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A Fix For The MS Office HTML Woes

Last week, I told you about an MS Office 2000 weirdness in which Word2000's "export as HTML" function creates code that crashes Netscape Navigator. FrontPage2000, on its own, won't or can't remove the code that Word puts in, even if you explicitly tell FP2K to create Navigator-compatible pages and not to use any fancy or advanced features. (See http://www.langa.com/newsletters/aug-26-99.htm#bug2 for more info.)

Reader Gunter Hartel found a fix:

Dear Mr. Langa

I stumbled upon an MS add-in that might solve your problem of microsoft codes in you HTML files after using WORD to grammar check.

Cheers

Gunter

The add-in is called the "Microsoft Office 2000 HTML Filter" and it strips out the MS-Office-specific code that Word puts in by default. You have to register at the site to get the download, but it's freely available at http://officeupdate.microsoft.com/2000/downloadDetails/htmlfilter.htm

To me, is seems that Microsoft has the defaults backwards: The default should be to produce generally-compatible code, with the special option to produce code that allows the use of Office's advanced features. It seems silly to have to add in a special filter just to produce basic, generic HTML.

But I'm glad there is such a filter, and thanks, Gunter, for finding it for us!

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Still Room For More Opinions

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!

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Those IE5 Clicking Noises...

Reader "Rick" wrote:

Here's the deal. Baffled every techie I can find. I have been getting a strange sound out of my WAVE OUTPUT whenever I hyperlink. The sound is very similar to what you'd hear when you turn on one of those "stun guns"....you know the electrical "popping" noise.......

It's only happening when I'm using MSIE 5.0 So what's the deal, Fred ? Can you find somebody that can figure this out ? The only way to stop it is to shut the system down and re-start....then, eventually, for no apparent reason, this rapid "popping" noise starts when I click on something to go to another link.

HELP!---Rick

Those little pops or clicklets are both erratic and annoying. They appear to be activated (or not) depending on how you launch a browser session. It's rather weird.

As far as I can tell, the navigation sound effect is controlled by a setting in Start/Settings/Control Panel/Sounds/Windows Explorer/Start Navigation

Yes, Windows Explorer is not the same as Internet Explorer, but they share the same code for HTML display. I'm assuming that the fact that the sound effect is bound via Windows Explorer is the reason why you don't always hear the sound when using Internet Explorer; but eventually, some common code is triggered, and the little rapid pops start sounding.

Anyone else have a better idea?

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