My weekly email and on-line newsletters are now available:

• free weekly Terry”s Computer Tips email newsletter
• weekly on-line Terry”s Computer Tips newsletter

This week’s online articles include:

• HOWTO: Writing Files to CD’s with Windows XP
• Updates Last Week discusses updates from Microsoft and other software publishers whom I track
• Web Browser Bug — IE and Firefox
• Reader Feedback
• IE7 - Problems Accessing the Internet
• My Computer Security Software Recommendations updated.
• HOWTO: Changing Program Icons

If you subscribe to the email newsletter now, you will get instructions on how to request automatic copies of the two most recent issues.

Comment about these articles using the “leave a response” link below…

Are you safe when you use the wireless network at your local coffee shop or airport?

Maybe. Maybe not.

Are you accidentally sharing your files on your computer? Is your computer “trusting” connection attempts from the other computers at the hostspot?

Read more in Wi-Fi Hotspots and Computer Security

Terry”s Computer Tips newsletters November 12th
My weekly email and on-line newsletters are now available:

• free weekly Terry”s Computer Tips email newsletter
• weekly on-line Terry”s Computer Tips newsletter

This week’s online articles include:

• Backing Up Your Computer & Data
• Updates Last Week discusses updates from Microsoft and other software publishers whom I track
• Backing Up to External Drives
• Firefox 2.0 Bookmarks
• HOWTO: Adding a SaveAs Button to Word/Excel/PowerPoint
• My Computer Security Software Recommendations updated.
• Dialup Internet Changes

If you subscribe to the email newsletter now, you will get instructions on how to request automatic copies of the two most recent issues.
Comment about these articles using the Comments Link below…

US-CERT released a security announcement today that there are security update versions of Firefox (web browser), Thunderbird (email & Usenet news) and SeaMonkey (suite) available today.

Since Netscape is based on the same Gecko engine, users of Netscape are urged to disable Javascript (presumably until a new Netscape version is released).
Quoting Mozilla.org’s site:

As part of Mozilla Corporation’s ongoing stability and security update process, Firefox 1.5.0.8 is now available for Windows, Mac, and Linux for free download from mozilla.com (http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/all-older.html). We strongly recommend that all Firefox 1.5.x users upgrade to this latest release. This update is available immediately in 37 languages including German, French, Spanish, Japanese, Simplified and Traditional Chinese, Korean, and more.

Note: Firefox 1.5.0.x will be maintained with security and stability updates until April 24, 2007. All users are strongly encouraged to upgrade to Firefox 2

Get Firefox

I just found out that Panda Software, makers of the Panda Antivirus program, has started a free online antivirus scan called ActiveScan.

As implied by the name, it uses ActiveX, so you have to use Internet Explorer to use this scanner. You should be using an antivirus program that runs all the time and that does scheduled “deep scans,” too. (I use NOD32 as my antivirus program.

But, you should also scan occasionally with one of the free online scanners, and I mean with one from a different antivirus company than the one whose product you use every day.

Here’s a quick link to Panda’s online ActiveScan: http://terryscomputertips.com/PandaScanner

Oh, yeah — I almost forgot to mention. They’re giving away a free 2GB iPod nano every week — to enter, just run a scan!

Accessing personal email while traveling can be something of a challenge. In an earlier article, I discussed actually getting access to the Internet.

That is the toughest part of checking your email while traveling. Once you get access, most ISP’s have provided a way for you to access your email remotely.

If you have a notebook, you should be able to start up your regular email program and download your emails from your usual ISP’s POP3 servers. In order to do this, I have a free dialup account at NetZero (which lets me have up to 10 hours dialup per month - Free!).

One problem, though, is that you will not be able to send email via your regular ISP if you haven’t dialed into their network (this is an anti-spam protection, to prevent the sending of spam).

Read more in Accessing Your Email While Travelling