How To Subscribe and Unsubscribe is at the end of this note. Mailing List Trouble? See http://www.langa.com/help.htm
Questions about the advertisers? See the end of this note. Please also see legal notices at the end of this note. LangaList: ISSN 1533-1156

Please recommend the LangaList to a friend! (And maybe win $10,000 !)

An easier-to read formatted HTML version of this newsletter is available
<a href=" http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2002/2002-03-25.htm ">here</a>

The LangaList
Standard Edition

2002-03-25

A Free Email Newsletter from Fred Langa
That Helps You Get More From Your Hardware, 
Software, and Time Online

Please visit our sponsors and help keep the LangaList S.E. free!

1) Free, Automatic Updates From The Knowledgebase

I have a love/hate relationship with the Microsoft Support site ( http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx ) and Knowledgebase ( http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=fh;en-us;kbinfo ): It's an amazingly rich resource for all manner of problem-solving info for the entire range of Microsoft products. But it's a bear to wade through.

There are two main problems. First, it's enormous (the Knowledgebase alone contains a quarter-million documents!), and Microsoft's own keyword-based search engine is sometimes less than wonderful. We've covered ways to help cope with this problem in the past, such as:

--- a way to use Google to mine just what's in the Support portions of Microsoft's site ( http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2001/2001-12-17.htm#2 )

--- a way to use Google to mine just what's in the actual Knowledgebase itself ( http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2001/2001-03-19.htm#9 )

--- and a way to obtain, in advance of your search, all the keywords Microsoft uses in its Knowledgebase: Knowing the keyword system lets you avoid off-target searches and zero in on just what you want. Although the original article on keywords has been withdrawn from the Microsoft site, it's still available in the Google cache of older pages. The resulting URL is huge, so if the next line has broken or wrapped, you'll need to reassemble it into one long, unbroken URL starting with "http" and ending with "asp":
http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:tl5ObHF8b9EC:support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q242/4/50.ASP

With those three approaches, you can find whatever's already in the Support site and Knowledgebase. But this doesn't solve the second problem: Keeping up. New stuff is added to the Knowledgebase all the time, and it's hard to monitor all 250+ support categories to see what's popping up.

That's where the independent, non-Microsoft KBalertz ("KnowledgeBase alerts") comes in. At http://www.kbalertz.com/ , you can sign up for automatic email notification of any new KB articles that are posted in any or all 250+ categories: When a new KB article goes up, you'll know about it, fast.

Combined, the search methods we've covered let you see what's already gone into the Knowledgebase, while KBalertz keeps you current with new just-posted info. Very cool!

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

2) Free Email Providers Going Away

Yahoo announced it'll soon start charging for what had been a longstanding free email service, and I'm told that Operamail is doing the same thing (I don't use Operamail, so I can't say from first-hand info). This follows on last year's switch from free to paid for most of the other major web-based mail services.

Those webmail services that didn't start charging for mail often imposed severe restrictions on use of the services, either limiting the number of emails you can get for free, or--- like Hotmail---by imposing strict limits on mailbox size. (Hotmail limits you to 2MB, unless you pony up for extra storage: The mail service still is free, but you have to pay to store more than a few items online.)

There still are smaller webmail services available, but you gotta wonder how long they'll be around. Given this uncertainty, I'd be loathe to use *any* free mail service for essential communications. I think they're good only for "throwaway" accounts you don't care about.

But even some email services you pay for aren't very good, either. See the next item, for example.

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

3) ATTBI's Email Fine-Print Gotcha

My cable internet access used to be provided through MediaOne, which got eaten by AT&T's "ATTBI" division.. When the new owners took over, they made many changes to the service, which prompted me to wade in and slog through the fine print of the new user agreement--- which, in typical fashion, supposedly had automatically become binding the moment I used their service for anything, including using it to read what I'd involuntarily "agreed" to.

But that's not the weird part. This is:

In order to provide a more effective e-mail service and control spam, AT&T Broadband Internet limits the number of e-mails you can send per day as well as the number of recipients to which you can send the same message.

If you are using the AT&T Broadband Internet Message Center, the maximum number of recipients per message is 25. There is also a limit of 100 messages per day.

I'm used to ISPs placing a limit on the number of recipients for any given message---although 25 is very, very low.  But the thing that frosted my cookies was the limit on the absolute number of emails you can send in a day, regardless of how many recipients there are. Some free services have similar limits on how much mail you can send--- but they're free. ATTBI is a premium-priced cable ISP!

And if 100 outbound emails a day seems ample, it's not for me: In recent months, I've sent about 11,000 emails per month--- about 350 per day--- through the MediaOne mail servers. There was no problem. But today: Same server, same connection, same everything--- except there are new owners--- and now  I can't send my normal volume of outbound email. Gee, thanks, AT&T.

(Note that the above has nothing to do with mailing the newsletters to you; that's done on by high-speed mailing-list service I use. I'm just talking about my own personal outbound email.)

At least for now, I can use my Web-server's SMTP service to send outbound email, and that's in fact what I'm dong now. But it's slower that way, and consumes some of the web server bandwidth, which I'd rather have go to serving you web pages.

My guess is that when AT&T says "in order to provide a more effective e-mail service," what they mean is: "We're cheap, and we want to put off hardware upgrades for as long as possible. The best way for us to do that is to keep you from using the service too much."

Next, it wouldn't surprise me if they put bandwidth caps on each customer. Grrr.

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

4) Reminder: If You Need To Change Your Email...

If you need to change the address at which you get your LangaList newsletters due to an email problem or change at  Yahoo, Operamail, Hotmail, ComCast, ATTBI, @Home, etc. etc. etc.--- or for ANY reason--- please note that I've posted a page on the Langa.Com web site that details how to change your subscription mailing address.

It's accessible from the "Change Your Subscription Address" links on the front page at http://www.langa.com , or you can get there in one step via: http://www.langa.com/change_address.htm .

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

5) SpamCop

While we're on the subject of email, reader David Bangs sent in an update on a good anti-spam service we haven't talked about in over a year:

Hi Fred, I think you would benefit from checking out the new services at http://spamcop.net . Spam has been a big problem for me, and I have tried a lot of different solutions. Most "solutions" were really invasive and ended up taking more energy to maintain that simply deleting the spam would have taken.

Spamcop now offers spam-filtered accounts for a flat $30 per year per account. I signed up for an account and set my ISP to forward all email there. Then I configured Outlook to download from mail.spamcop.net instead of my regular ISP. So, I get to send and receive email from my regular email account, but 95% of the spam is just gone. It doesn't reach me until I'm ready to look at "Held Messages."

The new system works by allowing blocking to be based on black lists from multiple providers. I initially turned on all the black lists. A simple link lets me log on and quickly see messages that have been "Held" . I noticed a few legitimate message had been blocked by one of the blacklists, so I deselected that blacklist. Now, no legitimate email is blocked. If a message were to be accidentally blocked, I could release it for delivery and whitelist the sender very easily.

Now, when I check my email with Outlook, the spam simply isn't there. A Spam gets through about once a day, but then I have time to report the sender with spamcop's excellent spam reporting tool. This sends a complaint to the appropriate organizations, but also allows spamcop to consider blacklisting the offending network.

The new system is also very fast If I send an email to myself, then check email again a few seconds later, the message arrives.

My one complaint is that SpamCop doesn't provide any end-user support except for newsgroups. I felt like a genius when I got Outlook to receive mail from their pop server but still send email using my ISP's SMTP server. There were no instructions on their site about how to configure Outook! People do help each other on the newsgroups, but if I wanted my mother or neighbor to use SpamCop, I would have to answer all their questions myself. In spite of the almost complete lack of help and support, you and many of your readers should really enjoy this service just the way it is. --David Bangs

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

6) Which File Formats Will Survive?

Reader Bob Schwartz asked an interesting question:

Fifty years is a long time, but my guess is that JPG and TXT aren't going to go away any time soon. The idea of burning your files to CD and including a viewer (an image tool for the JPG files and maybe NotePad for TXT) is fine, except that you probably have Windows applications now, and even if Windows is around in 50 years, it probably won't run tools from today's systems. But the JPG and TXT files themselves at least stand a chance of being readable by the software of the day.

Plus, CDs are cheap enough so it's not a big deal to re-burn them from time to time. If, some years from now, JPG is going away, you can use your then-current system to re-save the JPGs in a new format, and burn a new CD. (Actually, Writable-DVDs are the coming thing in storage: The standards-wars are being sorted out now, and hardware prices are dropping fast. In a year or two, DVD burners should be ubiquitous and affordable.)

But you'll need to pay attention to the media you buy, because some CDs may not last all that long. (See http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20010719S0003 for more info.) There will be similar concerns with future generations of DVD media, but there's not enough data on them yet to call the shot. Stay tuned--- I'm sure we'll have more info on the subject, and in less than 50 years, too. 8-)

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

7) Last Week To Enter March's FREE Drawing

On March 31, I'll choose another monthly winner of a no-strings $30 Gift Certificate for any item at Amazon.Com--- books, software, hardware, kitchenware, toys... To have a shot at winning, 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 $30 shopping spree! (Full details also available via this link): http://www.langa.com/recommend.htm

The more times you make a recommendation, the greater your chances are of winning!

Or, if you'd like to try to win $10,000(!), try this link (full details also available here):
http://www.recommend-it.com/l.z.e?s=143182

Either way, thank you, and good luck!

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

8) They Just Keep Coming And Coming and Coming...

Almost two thousand of your fellow readers have "Loaded the code." Please click over to http://www.langa.com/code.htm , and maybe you can join them! (If you've already "Loaded The Code" and are wondering if your site will appear here or on the Langa.Com web site, please see http://www.langa.com/link.txt  )

Speaking of which: Here's another eclectic sample of reader sites--- some professional, some very personal:

View A Randomly-Chosen Reader Site
http://www.langa.com/randomlink.htm

Manually Browse All Posted-to-Date Sites Starting At
http://www.langa.com/readersites.htm

Ultralight Helicopter
http://web.northstate.net/~emdeedee/page1propcopter.htm

Indonesian Food
http://www.angelfire.com/trek/combuisindo/entry.htm

Amateur Radio (from Mississippi)
http://www.angelfire.com/ms3/n5ycn/home.html

An "attempt to take over the world"
http://www.angelfire.com/ky3/Grimey/Take_over_the_world.html

Doctor's personal web site
http://www.drdnpate.com/

Cotton Family
http://webpages.charter.net/jstewart/compute.html

RonRee
http://ronree.com/

Unity of Birmingham Church
http://www.unitybham.com/index.html

Message Center
http://sixmessagecenter.homestead.com/

Mike Carey (UK)
http://www.mikecarey.co.uk/

"Computer Stuff"
http://webpages.charter.net/jstewart/compute.html

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

9) Where Did "SYSOC.INF" Go?

In "XP & NTFS Reader Tips" ( http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2002/2002-03-18.htm#7 ) we talked about editing the SYSOC.INF file in XP to "unHide" various components that normally can't be removed. Once they're unHidden, they often can be removed through the normal Add/Remove software option in Control Panel.

Many readers had trouble finding either the file, and the \Windows\Inf folder in which the file normally resides:

I could not follow this suggestion - I searched the registry and could not find any references. Also a directory file search did not bring up SYSOC.INF. Is there something missing from the instructions? --- Richard Shaw

XP, like all Windows since Win95, normally tries to keep you away from system files. By default, some folders and file types just don't show up at all. But in XP, as with earlier versions of Windows, you can use the Folder Options menu (it's under Tools, in XP) to adjust what you're shown. We actually provided step-by-step instructions on how to make all versions of Windows show you everything--- as I believe all operating systems should--- in a variety of articles over time. Most recently, we covered how to make XP show you all files and folders as part of this article: http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20011204S0009 .

XP also has the further wrinkle (as does Win2K) of limiting what you can get at unless you're in an account with Administrator privileges, or actually logged on as Admin. If you've set up your own system, odds are you *are* the Admin; but if you're on a machine someone else set up, you may have only "guest" or otherwise-limited system privileges, and may not be able to get at the full \Windows folder.

I guess the days of a "simple tip" are over, eh?

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

10) Just For Grins

A mini-grin: In light of our recent "pooch" discussion, when reader Dave Miller saw the following site, he says he laughed so hard he could barely type.

I can see why: In one of the worst moments in software nomenclature, a company has named its Macintosh application--- you guessed it--- "Pooch." ( http://www.daugerresearch.com/pooch/whatis.html )

That spurred me to do a Google search, only to find Pooch Records, the Pooch Cafe, Project Pooch, a site called "Welcome to Planet Pooch," on and on for some 82,000 pooch-related sites.

Whole lotta poochin' going on.

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

11) Plus! Edition Highlights

• Reader Rave Re: Email Notification/Retrieval Program
• Increase Safety With XP Custom Accounts
• Free And  Easy Suite Of Office Tools

Today's LangaList Plus! Edition contains all ten items above, plus about 30% more content including: A reader's thumbs-up on a powerful tool that can let you know about (and retrieve) email from up to 16 separate password-protected email accounts; a way you can isolate dangerous activities while running XP; and info on an amazing, FREE suite of office tools.

Plus! Edition info: http://www.langa.com/plus.htm 

Click to email this item to a friend
  http://www.langa.com/sendit.htm

return to top of page

See you next issue!

Best,

Fred
(fred@langa.com)

Please recommend the LangaList to a friend! (And maybe win $10,000!I)

An easier-to read formatted HTML version is available in the "Current Issue" section of http://www.langa.com.  (The HTML version of each issue normally is available by 9AM EST [UT-5] of the issue date.) All past LangaList issues are also available at the Langa.Com site.

return to top of page

Administrivia:

UNSUBSCRIBE: From the same email account you used to sign up with), send an email to
unsubscribe-langalist@lyris.dundee.net

SUBSCRIBE (it's free!): Create and send a new email to
subscribe-langalist@lyris.dundee.net

CHANGE ADDRESS? LIST TROUBLE? HAVE QUESTIONS? OTHER PROBLEM? NEED HELP? See http://www.langa.com/help.htm

This is a 100% OPT-IN newsletter: See http://www.langa.com/info.htm

About the advertisers: http://www.langa.com/privacy.htm#ads

Disclaimer: http://www.langa.com/legal.htm  In brief: All information herein is offered as-is and without warranty of any kind. Neither Langa Consulting LLC, nor its employees nor contributors are responsible for any loss, injury, or damage, direct or consequential, resulting from your choosing to use of any information presented here.

This newsletter is a service of Langa Consulting LLC and is Copyright © 1997-2005 Fred Langa/ Langa Consulting LLC. All worldwide rights reserved. LangaList: ISSN 1533-1156

return to top of page