PCWize Vol 4, Issue 39 - Wrastlin' geeks and other oddities September 24, 2000 ______________________________________________________________________ You could win $10,000 and a Sony DVD player just by recommending PCWize to a friend! ------ Well, there's good news and bad news! The good news, is that I'm finally going to be moving, starting a new career, and starting life over with my wife and daughter. The bad news, is that this is all going to take considerable time and energy on my part, so... This will be the last PCWize issue you'll receive for a while-- maybe about two or three months. I hate to have to kill it off for a little while, but there is just no way for me to concentrate on writing quality stuff while everything else is going on. There is good news though! I've finally posted all of the PCWize editions ever written to the web site. Take a gander at: A little forewarning though... The further back in history you go, the more you'll probably need aspirin and a stiff drink! I'm serious! Some of the early stuff is positively stomach-turning! Have fun with the oldies! I hope to be force-feeding you more PCWize goodness in the near future! The funny thing is that The NMI and I are both doing the moving thing. How's that for a coincidence! Too bad we'll miss each other by a couple of weeks when he comes to Japan. :-( ------ Good deal! We got plenty of positive feedback concerning the new Randomness section. Looks like it's here to stay for a while. There were a couple of suggestions mentioned like including a WinAMP plugin of the week, and mentioning recently released updates/upgrades to software. Both are good suggestions, and while we will try to be accommodating, I foresee the WinAMP plugin of the week having a fairly short shelf-life due to the limited number (relative to skins) of available "good ones". As for the software updates/upgrades, if it's something that we use, then we'll stick it in there. We just don't have the time or resources to keep track of the tons of software that would fit in this section. ------ Another "Tale from the Daughterside"! My wife and daughter have been conspiring to come up with new and inventive ways of getting my lazy butt out of bed on the weekends, and the latest must have taken some considerable study and rigorous training. I awoke one morning to see my daughter standing next to me on the bed. She looked down upon me with her radiant smile, raised her arms, leapt into the air, and performed a body-slam so perfect that professional wrestlers would have sat up and took note! Where was my wife during all this? Standing in the doorway laughing her butt off! Seeing as how I skipped a couple of issues trying to get everything in order for our impending move, here's another "Tale from the Daughterside" We were in our local AAFES Toyland (ahem, more like ToyCLOSET if you ask me), and while I was standing there looking at some new-fangled toy with lots of lights and noises, I heard my daughter behind me talking to someone. I turned around to see who she was gabbing with, and there was Santa Claus! Now, don't ask me what the Jolly Ol' Fat Man was doing out in the middle of September, but hey, I've given up trying to fathom why AAFES does most of the things it does anyway. So, here is my daughter hanging on to the red suited dude's leg and reaching into his candy basket-- this is the same girl who screamed bloody murder the last time she met him. She looks up at me and says "Look daddy, Santa!" I smiled back and said, "Great!" By then, a good number of kids had surrounded him, and he was asking what each of them wanted for Christmas. There were many requests for things Pokemon, things WWW wrestling, trucks, dolls etc. He then looked down at my little Ashley and asked what she wanted for Christmas. She placed a thoughtful finger on her cute little lips, pondered a second or two, looked up with a beautiful smile, and said "Orange Juice". I think ol' Santa got stumped there for a minute, because he looked confused. Heck, I was confused! I didn't want anyone to think my little girl was weird or anything, so I piped up and said "Tropicana of course!" Somehow, I think they thought we were both weird. ------ For the female population among our readers who felt that "Geeksterone" sounded too masculine (and here I was hoping for gender neutrality), you now have "Geekstrogen". Go forth and allow your respective geek juices to flow! ______________________________________________________________________ Table Of Contents - HackTech by The NMI - Randomness - Voting Booth and Other PCWize Stuff - Software Review - Cool Sites - Tips, Tricks, Do's and Don't Do's - That's the news! - Security Issues, Hoaxes, Viruses and Other Urban Legends - PCWize Contests and winner announcement If the columns in the below articles appear misaligned, it's because you are using a non-fixed width font. If you would like to see them as written, please change your e-mail font to Courier New. ______________________________________________________________________ ** A word from our sponsors ** ------ http://www.creditcardanalyzer.com - find out how much your credit cards are costing you and see how much money you could save by transferring the balance to a lower interest card ------ Want to see your advertisement here? For more information, go here: ______________________________________________________________________ HackTech by The NMI AND AWAY WE GOOOOOO... ------ Yes, at last, I am back. At least, for a little while, anyway. I feel I should explain my absence with a short song I wrote, which goes like... What? You don't want to hear my amazing Acapulco? My fabulous falsetto? Ok, ok, enough with the song stuff already - It's not like I have time anyway, with moving and everything. I AM uprooting, but just changing houses really, I'm still in the same city and all. The bad part is that all this commotion isn't in the least bit done. In a few months, probably around November or December, I will be going to Japan on business for a few months, quite close to where Leif works, actually. He won't BE there when I get there, but perhaps that will give me an excuse to do some sight-seeing while I am there and pay him a visit where ever he DOES end up at. The coolest thing about all this mess is that even though I am changing mailing addresses, phone numbers (damn telemarketers), and everything else, I will STILL keep in contact with important people through ICQ, and E-mail, and hopefully another way: DSL. Though not a perfect technology, DSL, or Digital Subscriber Line is MUCH faster than your average 56K line, which for some people around here it only goes to 33.6K on a GOOD day! This was part of the reason for my move, as DSL was not available where I lived previously. Does that sound silly, moving because of the Internet? I admit to spending an inordinate amount of time doing what can best be described as "stuff" : Anything from searching for a way to say "Get lost!" in Swedish, to downloading Linux source code for just about anything, to playing some of my favorite games, like Unreal Tournament on-line. All that is nice, but the MAIN reason I got DSL, and moved to get it, was for my son. As I said earlier, I will be going to Japan on business, and for various reasons, can't take him along with me. Staying in touch by cards and letters isn't very feasible for a five-year-old, even with his guardian taking care to read each one to him. Phone calls are ok to some extent, but still leave something to be desired. I chose the next best thing: Video Conferencing! With a DSL connection where my son is at, even though I am in Japan, I will be able to get streaming video back and forth at an acceptable rate, unlike a cheesy 56K connection, which delivers very halting choppy video in a small window on your screen. My "master system" has a few requirements, which go like this: * NO maintenance required, for a few months time, at the least. * Must be self contained, able to restart itself, and handle problems on its own. * Must be accessible from the Internet, but through a secure connection * Physical access to the device will be limited to a camera, mic, and screen. Pretty stringent requirements, I know - Think "NASA space probe" without planning to take the thing anywhere, and you've pretty much got it. I liked the DSL option because it's (generally) an always-on system. Even when there are outages, and don't let anyone tell you there aren't, the connection resumes, and your system can just about continue on from there. With a dial-up connection, you have the fun task of trying to re-dial, who knows how many times, and hope that the server will talk to your system, if not, redial... I know this because I've had that problem, even with different ISPs at different times. DSL can help to alleviate SOME of those problems. Now with the requirement of "No maintenance required..." and "...able to handle problems on it's own..." some of you may already be thinking that one beautiful word - say it with me now: "LINUX"! Sorry to all you Micro$oft fans out there, but if there's only one area where Windows, even Windows NT, can't touch Linux, it's in the area of stability. Once you get a distro of Linux up and running with tried-and-true apps, it's almost sure to be rock solid stable. All you NT administrators out there with "My system crashed" emergency pagers know what I'm talking about. I am still finalizing the details of hardware and software, trying to find all the right pieces, and making sure everything plays well together. I will probably go with Mandrake 7.1 for now, because it's getting SOOO easy to install and work with, and as for the hardware, well, that's another story. Finding vendors that support something OTHER than Windoze is getting ever so slightly easier these days, and as far as the networking stuff goes, LinkSys has their stuff together! I'm using a 10/100 card in the system, and love the fact that it will work with Linux. The motherboard will probably be an Abit or Asus board with a generic 8 meg video card, 128Meg of RAM, and a Celeron 500, just because I don't need THAT much power in this thing, but the chips are getting so cheap nowadays that I might as well. I'd rather have a little extra power than realize when I get to Japan that I didn't have ENOUGH. I know, I know, it's overkill for a machine strictly being used for video conferencing, but I AM allowed to geek a little here :) The NMI Send your Linux Video Conferencing Software suggestions to: TheNMI@PCWIZE.COM ______________________________________________________________________ Randomness ------ Tagline(s) of the Week: - When planets run around and around in circles, we say they are orbiting. When people do it, we say they are crazy. - Genetics explains why you look like your father, and if you don't, why you should. Geekword of the week: Pixel - Pixel is short for "Picture Element", and consists of a triad made of one red, green, and blue dot. These three dots vary in individual intensity to create a single pixel of color, and a group of pixels visualized together create an image. When you specify a resolution of 800x600, you are defining 800 pixels horizontally and 600 pixels vertically. If you'd like to read up more on pixels and how monitors and graphics work, then visit the PCWize web site at: and WinAMP Skin of the Week: - WinAMP Millennium Edition Elite by Tom Klepl Did you know: - A 'jiffy' is a real unit of time measuring 1/100th of a second! - If the top-facing number of pips on a die was three, what would the bottom-facing number of pips be? How about four! Opposing sides of a die always add up to seven. - ICQ is up to 87.3 MILLION accounts! Granted, probably many aren't in use or are set up by spammers, but that's still a lot of accounts to keep track of. Funny of the week: Words that don't exist, but should! Submitted by one of my favorite readers, Terry Speer. - Lactomangulation (lak' to man gyu lay' shun) n. Manhandling the 'open here' spout on a milk container so badly that one has to resort to the 'illegal' side. - Phonesia (fo nee' zhuh) n. The affliction of dialing a phone number and forgetting whom you were calling just as they answer. - Frust (frust) n. The small line of debris that refuses to be swept onto the dustpan and keeps backing a person across the room until he finally decides to give up and sweep it under the rug. ______________________________________________________________________ Voting Booth and Other PCWize Stuff ------ Click here to vote for PCWize as one of the best newsletters in the "E-zines Top Ten Poll"! It's just a click, no need to fill anything out. ------ Come visit the PCWize forum and live chat. You can discuss anything computer related and it's a good place to get help with any computer questions you may have. ______________________________________________________________________ Software Review ------ Name: PowerArchiver 2000 by eFront Media Inc. Genre: File Compression Platform: PC Win 9x/NT/00 Type/Cost: Freeware Size: 2.10MB Homepage: Download: It's time to stop paying for file compression, and PowerArchiver 2000 is your ticket on the free bus. WinZIP is nice, but it's shareware, and it doesn't handle .RAR compressed files, which is a superior compression format. To handle these, you need to get something like WinRAR. Unfortunately, WinRAR just isn't as user friendly as WinZIP. Now, if you're already familiar with the WinZIP interface, you'll be in for no serious surprises, because PowerArchiver looks and acts almost exactly the same-- even down to the dialog boxes. The cool thing about PowerArchiver-- aside from it being free and easy to use, is that it supports the following formats: Full built-in support for creating and adding files to ZIP (+JavaARhiver, +Quake's III PK3, +REP, +QWK), CAB, LHA (LZH), BH (BlakHole), TAR, TAR.GZ and TAR.BZ2 archives Built-in support for reading and extracting many other formats: RAR, ARJ, ARC, ACE, ZOO, GZIP , BZIP2 Full built-in support for XXE and UUE Internet encoded files It also has a built in viewer for files of the following formats: TXT, RTF, BMP, WMF, EMF, JPG (JPEG), GIF and ICO files Speaking of .BMP, that's all you need to skin the PowerArchiver toolbar. Take a copy of the .BMP toolbar, edit it to your hearts delight, then make that the toolbar in the options menu. This is a great option for those of you who have always wanted to personalize your skinnable software with your home grown skins, but found that creating a skin for most applications isn't as easy as it looks! You just can't beat it! This is a great piece of software at the best possible price! It isn't even ADWare! ______________________________________________________________________ Cool Sites ------ Do lawyers deserve all the bad credit? After reading this site, you'll think they aren't getting enough bad press. ------ Can't get enough of conspiracy theories? Here's another site to whet your appetite. ------ A lost and found that you can buy from. When luggage goes on its own trip, it just might end up here when there's nobody to claim it. It seems like they get all manner of things in this place, and they're all for sale. There's even a lingerie section. Hmmmmm, I'm sure my wife would really appreciate me buying some used lingerie for her! But, I guess if you're on a tight budget... ______________________________________________________________________ Tips, Tricks, Do's and Don't Do's ------ Don't take any wooden nickles! Sorry folks, just don't have time to give you all the goodies in this issue. The good news is that all our household goods have been packed and are ready for shipment to our new home. We'll be down for a couple of months, but don't worry, we WILL be back! Kind of like that rash I've ... errr, nevermind! ;-) ______________________________________________________________________ That's the news! ------ Wireless modems hit 128kbps! Good news for those of us mobile geeks, Metricom has started a 128kbps wireless service in Baltimore, Dallas, Houston, Philadelphia, Phoenix New York, San Francisco, Seattle, Washington D.C., Atlanta and San Diego. Too bad I won't be anywhere near these places. :-( ______________________________________________________________________ Security Issues, Hoaxes, Viruses and Other Urban Legends ------ Please visit http://www.pcwize.com/tech/computer/secdef.shtml if you would like to know the definitions for hoaxes, viruses, worms and urban legends. ------ Steve Gibson of GRC.com fame has been looking into the spyware issue very, very heavily. Steve has been my reliable source of information for a long time now, and his latest work will make your skin crawl. Take a look at his research into software that monitors what you do on the Internet. ______________________________________________________________________ PCWize Contests and Winner Announcement ------ Each week PCWize holds a random drawing contest and gives away free stuff (usually software) to its subscribers. We will continue to do this as long as there are advertisers who are willing to provide the prizes. If you are such an individual/company, then please contact me at editor@pcwize.com so that we can work a deal. ------ You'll start seeing some cool prizes when we come back, and The NMI has come up with some ingenious contests for you all to get into the fun with. ______________________________________________________________________ Well, that's it for this issue! Have a good week and I'll see you in seven days. Leif Gregory Copyright © 1997-00 by Leif Gregory. All rights reserved. You may share this copy of the PCWize newsletter with others as long as it is reprinted in it's entirety to include the copyright notice and subscription directions. If you've received this edition of the PCWize newsletter from a friend or colleague and wish to start receiving your own copy, then click the below link and send the generated e-mail message. I have made every attempt to ensure that all information contained in this newsletter is accurate to the best of my ability. Due to the myriad of possible configurations in the PC platform, information and software discussed here may not always work with your particular configuration. That being said, Leif Gregory and the PCWize newsletter can not be held liable for any damages you may incur either directly or indirectly from the use of anything contained in this newsletter. PCWize does not endorse any of the products or services provided by advertisers in this newsletter. As with anything in life, please check the credibility of the advertiser as well as to use common sense. If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is. PCWize Editor PCWize Homepage Unsubscribe