Terry's Computer Tips - Newsletter
November 18, 2007

Terry's Computer Tips Newsletter
http://www.terryscomputertips.com
A computer tips newsletter for users of PC's.

Volume 3, Number 23 — Sunday, November 18, 2007

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IN THIS WEEK'S ON-LINE ISSUE:
   1.   Searching Google - the Google Cheat Sheet
   2.   Updates Last Week
   3.   My Computer Security Software Recommendations
   4.   Recommend my Terry's Computer Tips Newsletter to Your Friends

Welcome to the on-line edition of my Terry's Computer Tips newsletter.

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If you find an email in your Spam folder or Bulk Mail folder that you really want to receive -- be sure to click on their button to reclassify the email in their system. It will help you and it will help others.

1.  Searching Google - the Google Cheat Sheet

Do you search the web using Google? I do. It's easy and you can find the answer to almost any question via the web.

Some people, though, are intimidated by the search engines at Google.com, Yahoo.com and Live.com (the renamed MSN.com) among others. The only real problem between them is that they don't all use the same ways for fine-tuning your search. That's the reason I stay with Google for searching - I know how and don't have to guess how to use a new search engine.

What can you do, for example?

If you want to find web pages that include certain specific words, let's use the words dog and kennel as examples, all you have to do is to enter
dog kennel
in the search engine form and click the search button.

There's a slight problem with this approach. The word "dog" and the word "kennel" will both be on the page, but the page may not refer to a dog kennel.

In order to find "dog kennel", all you have to do is put the term in double-quotes. That way, Google will find the phrase.

Perhaps you wanted to find a kennel but didn't want to see the word "cat" on the page. Google lets you put a minus-sign immediately before any words you want to exclude. So, we would search for
kennel -cat

Want to learn more about how to search using Google? Download the Google Cheat Sheet from Google.

 

2.  Updates Last Week

Microsoft (operating systems, email, web browser, office suites):
Microsoft releases almost all updates once per month, on the second Tuesday. This week included Patch Tuesday. These are the updates I saw on my XP machines:

Windows XP

Security Update for Windows XP (KB943460)
A security issue has been identified that could allow an attacker to compromise your Windows-based system and gain control over it. You can help protect your computer by installing this update from Microsoft. After you install this item, you may have to restart your computer.

Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool - November 2007 (KB890830)
After the download, this tool runs once to check your computer for infection by specific, prevalent malicious software (including Blaster, Sasser, and Mydoom) and helps to remove any infection found. If an infection is found, the tool will display a status report the next time you start your computer. A new version of the tool will be offered every month. If you want to manually run the tool on your computer, you can download a copy from the Microsoft Download Center or run an online version from microsoft.com. This tool is not a replacement for an anti-virus product. To help protect your computer, you should use an anti-virus product.

Microsoft Office 2003

Update for Outlook Junk Email Filter 2003 (KB943552)
This update provides the Junk E-mail Filter in Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 with a more current definition of which e-mail messages should be considered junk e-mail. This update was released in November 2007.

Firefox (web browser, http://www.mozilla.com, free):
No new version. Version 2.0.0.9 was released on Thursday, November 1, 2007. This release corrected some stability problems in the previous release.

Opera (web browser, http://www.opera.com, free):
No new version this week. Version 9.24 was released on October 17th. This release is a recommended security upgrade.

Opera 9.50 beta 1 became available on October 25th. Based on the changelog, there are a lot of changes coming to Opera. But, bewware, if you're using OperaMail, this is a one-way upgrade as it will change your mail storage system.

Netscape (web browser, http://browser.netscape.com, free):
No new version this week. Version 9.0.0.3 was released this week. If you're using Netscape 8, the automatic update will not update to 9.0.0.3. You'll need to download and install version 9.0.0.3 manually.

SeaMonkey (web browser, email, HTML editor, newsreader; http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey; free): No new version this week. Version 1.1.6 was released on November 5, 2007.

Eudora (email, http://www.eudora.com):
No update last week. Version 7.1.0.9 was released October 11, 2006. Eudora is now free, with no ads and no "paid mode" option.

The first beta version of v8 (v8.0.0.b1) was released several weeks ago and is available from http://wiki.mozilla.org/Penelope_Releases .

Mozilla Thunderbird (email, http://www.mozilla.com/thunderbird, free):
No new version this week. Thunderbird version 2.0.0.6 was released on August 1, 2007. This is primarily a security update.

OpenOffice (office suite — spreadsheet, word processor, presentations, graphics, web design; http://www.openoffice.org; free): No new version this week. Version 2.3 was released during the week ending September 22nd. This version includes new features as well as bug fixes.

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3.  My Computer Security Software Recommendations

Anti-Virus

I no longer recommend Trend Micro's products. At this point, my sole recommendation for anti-virus is NOD32 from ESET, which is my choice for my family's computers.

That may change, but at this time, Trend Micro's PC-cillin Internet Security — is reporting at least one Commission Junction URL as "Dangerous." The URL that was flagged was the domain for the ad's image. PC-cillin recommended that users close their web browsers and not visit the site that linked to it again. My issue is that Commission Junction is a well-respected affiliate sales system used by many computer and non-computer-related companies.

Interestingly enough, Trend Micro sells its products through Commission Junction's affiliate system, too, including having using the same domain that they complain about.

Obviously someone at Trend Micro made a mistake, but since this subject came up on an ad image displayed on my site, the warning was given to a user visiting my site! Totally unacceptable.

I'm often asked about several other popular anti-virus or anti-virus combination packages. Yes, I realize that they are not in my recommendation list. "Enough said..."

My personal choice is the ESET's small, fast NOD32 anti-virus program, which offers a FREE 30-day evaluation license. I consider NOD32 to be the cream of the crop in anti-virus protection. Unlike some of the others, ESET offers multiple-year licenses also, including updates to the program in the multiple-year license.

Many antivirus programs will offer you an anti-virus signature subscription renewal when your subscription renews. I strongly recommend against this option. Vendors routinely improve the capabilities and speed fo the programs also.

If you update only the signatures, you miss any program improvements. Fortunately, NOD32's subscriptions include both program updates and signature updates.

Read more about anti-virus programs on my web site.

Related articles:

• Anti-Virus Programs and Online Scanners
• Free Online Antivirus Scan
• NOD32 Anti-Virus Review - A Look at NOD32

Firewall Software

If you get the PC-cillin Internet Security package above, you are covered from a firewall point of view.

While the Windows XP firewall is much better than no firewall at all, don't count on the Windows XP firewall to meet your needs. You need a two-way firewall, which the Windows XP firewall is not!.

The Windows XP firewall does not control outbound communications originating from your computer — and you should want to have control if adware/trojans/spyware or even commercial products want to talk to the Internet.

Do you want Windows Media Player to call home every time you play something? It does! Do you use the Search function in Windows Explorer to find things on your hard drive? Did you know that every time you search, Windows Explorer talks to Microsoft — I didn't know that when I ran ZoneAlarm, but the Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall flags that for me, and I can stop or allow it to happen.

Many other programs call home when you run them, too.

If you don't get either of the above multi-function packages, I recommend my choice for a firewall program is Sunbelt Personal Firewall.

You can try the full-featured "paid version" of Sunbelt Personal Firewall free for 30 days — after that, you can register it or, if you're using it on a home non-business computer, you can let it revert to the free, lesser-function license. Sunbelt Personal Firewall is $19.95 (with discounts for multiple computers!) for a non-expiring license for the program and includes one year of their updates subscription.

Related articles:

• The Internet Versus You
• Do I Need a Firewall Program?
• Sunbelt Personal Firewall Review

Anti-Spyware / Anti-Adware Software

CounterSpy, from Sunbelt Software, has received many kudos from the computer press for its always-running and periodic full system scans. It is also my personal choice for my PC's and my family's PC's.

Sunbelt released their CounterSpy v2 in early February and I promptly updated my computers to it. Version 2 greatly improved CounterSpy's performance and reduced its load on the computer when it was scanning.

Recently (late July, 2007), Sunbelt released v2.5 of CounterSpy, which again both improved CounterSpy's performance against malware and reduced its impact on system resources and responsiveness when its scanning.

Related articles:

• Fighting Against Spyware & Malware
• CounterSpy Review

Anti-spam Software

In today's Internet world, the question is not "if" you will get spam, but "how much will you get?"

I use and now I recommend POPFile as my first choice for handling spam. POPFile sits on your computer, between your email program and your ISP mailbox, and handles emial as it downloads.

POPFile uses a different approach to handle spam than some other programs do — it does nothing to reduce spam. It is designed as an email classification tool — you train it to recognize spam and any other type of email that you want to classify. These classifications can help you sort your emails into appropriate folders in your email program.

Sunbelt Software, who makes the anti-spyware program CounterSpy (which I use and recommend) and the firewall that I use and recommend (Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall) also has a well-regarded, award-winning anti-spam program called iHateSpam for Outlook and Outlook Express. Since I don't use Outlook or Outlook Express for email, I haven't tried iHateSpam.

Mailwasher Pro is my first choice to handle spam before it ever gets into your computer's Inbox. Mailwasher Pro uses on-line Realtime Black Lists mail servers sending spam recently, "training" by you of what you think is spam, and your own "friends" and "blacklist" lists.

Mailwasher Pro can even bounce spam messages, as if your email address was not valid, although the usefulness and appropriateness of this is questionable. There is a free version called "Mailwasher," but it omits the functions that I consider critical for this purpose -- such as safely previewing the emails safely before they ever get to your email inbox.

Cable/DSL Router

If you have a cable modem or a DSL modem, you need to have another layer of inexpensive protection between you and the Internet. A cable/DSL router isolates your computer from direct connection to the Internet. Your computer can easily request your email, web pages, etc. through the router. The responses come back to the router and are smoothly routed to your computer. But, someone on the Internet side of the router can not initiate a connection to your computer — they can only respond to your request.

Even if you only have one computer to connect to your cable or DSL modem, I recommend that you purchase and use a cable/DSL router because of the protection it can give you against attempts to attack through some flaws in Windows itself.

A router isolates your local network, whether it is only one computer or several, from the Internet by actually making it a separate network. The router gets the "public" IP address and handles all your outbound communications and the responses to them. But, it blocks computers on the Internet side from being able to initiate communications with your computer! This will prevent you from falling prey to many worms that try to attack security holes in Windows itself.

For a wireless router, I recommend the Linksys WRT54G wireless router. I'm using the relatively new version 6 of this router.

If you don't want wireless, I recommend the Linksys BEFSR41 wired router. Either way, based on my experience, I recommend Linksys routers for price, reliability and Linksys' habit of releasing updated firmware for their products..

See these related articles:

• Wireless Security
• Wi-Fi Hotspots and Computer Security
• Wireless Networking Problems & Wireless Networking Security

4.  Recommend my Terry's Computer Tips Newsletter to Your Friends

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Volume 3, Number 23 — Sunday, November 18, 2007

Copyright © 2007 Terry A. Stockdale.  All rights reserved.