Free Dialup Internet Access – great backup solution

I was chatting with Walter Scott, one of my local friends and a Terry’s Computer Tips Newsletter reader, at lunch last week. Walter has a new notebook computer and was trying to come up with a good solution for dialup access for two purposes.

First, when he travels, he wants to have a good dialup solution with local phone numbers in most of the country. Many hotels have wired or wireless Internet access, but not all of them — or they charge an outrageous price like $10/day for high-speed access.

Second, he wanted a backup connection via dialup for those times when he has cable Internet troubles (ever notice that your phone still works, even though your electric utility has lost power in your area of town?) — I sent my August 29th Terry’s Computer Tips Newsletter via dialup on Hurricane Katrina Day — no power, but my notebook had its battery and my telephone worked.

I mentioned to Walter that he could Get Free NetZero Internet Access for 10 hours per month.

Read Walter’s comments about free dialup from NetZero

Wireless Security

First, be sure to connect to the router using an Ethernet cable for your configuration work – otherwise, with the first change, you’ll get locked out. If you are using wireless to login to the router, if you get locked out, you’ll have to wait for the router to time out and close that login.

Know these definitions,

* SSID = Server Set ID – basically, this is the network name
* MAC Address = a unique code for every networking device
* WEP = “Wired Equivalent Privacy” (don’t you believe it!)
* WPA = newer technology “Wi-Fi Protected Access”

First, I recommend that you secure your network.

Many people believe in having their network open — available to anyone who might want to use it. Without considering whether such sharing this may or may not be in compliance with your ISP’s terms and conditions of your service, you should consider the impact on the individual computers of your network.

Read more in my Wireless Security article.

Renaming Multiple Files

Recently, I needed to rename several folders of files. They were all HTML files for web sites with the extension “.html”, which means that they are static HTML files — they don’t change when they’re called.

I wanted them to be “.php” files so that I could make file maintenance easier. This way, I can have common headers, footers and other parts of the page — and have them stored one time in a single file.

Also, that way, if I want to change the footer, I change it in the footer’s file. Then, as each web page gets called, it grabs the footer file and includes it. All I have to do is to make one change to one file — and they’re all changed.

My tool for this was a freeware program called Lupus Rename.

By the way, I also received an email from someone who wanted to rename a bunch of picture files from their camera. The camera named the files something like “NAME 001.JPG”, while their slideshow program wanted the names formatted like “001 NAME.JPG”. That kind of modification looks like it would be easy with Lupas Rename.

Read more in Renaming Multiple Files with Lupas Rename

Hot-Swapping USB Devices

In computer terminology, Hot-Swapping refers to being able to disconnect and remove hardware, as well as installing and connecting hardware, without turning off a computer.

Generally, this is a dumb idea, since most operating systems and most hardware aren’t prepared for you to do that.

In fact, a lot of internal hardware (drives and memory, for example) can fry if you connect them while your computer is powered. PS2 ports for keyboard and mouse are also subject to frying themselves — the motherboard connector, not the frying the cheap keyboard or mouse — if you unplug or plug a device into a PS2 port. Of course, new computers today seldomly have PS2 ports, but those from recent years have them.

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Many new devices use USB connections to connect to the computer. Examples of devices using USB connectors today are keyboards, mice, scanners, flash drives, cameras, some network adapters, and even more items.

Although hot-swapping is billed as one of the big advantages of USB, the devices are not all “hot swappable.

Read more in Hot-Swapping USB Devices

Windows Security Updates Fix Vista Issue, too

AP has a good article about yesterday’s “Patch Tuesday” updates from Microsoft. Microsoft releases almost all updates on one day each month — the 2nd Tuesday of the month.

This time, there were 6 crifical updates, including one for the “malicious software engine” that powers Windows Defender, including on Vista.

What kind of problem? The usual — a flaw that could let the attacker take over the whole computer! In the anti-malware program, no less…

If you haven’t done your Microsoft Updates, do them now. IF you’re still using Windows Updates, start Windows Updates manually, then click on the option on the right-hand side of the screen to upgrade to Microsoft Updates.

Microsoft Updates will update Windows, Word, Excel, Powerpoint and other Microsoft programs — all in one step. Windows Updates only handled Windows — you had to go to other places at microsoft.com to get the other updates.

“Publisher could not be verified” warnings

Everybody must be seeing this warning frequently, because my “Publisher could not be verified” warnings article sure is getting a lot of visitors.

Flash Drive Not Recognized

Subscriber “jkp” wrote to ask for help:

I am running Windows XP Home. The problem I am having is with a Lexar jump drive that I’ve purchased (128MB). My computer won’t recognize it all the time I plug it in..?? Sometimes it works..most times it won’t work. Frustrating as ****.

Any solution to this problem?

Thanks
Jack

I know of one circumstance where any Windows XP machine will fail to recognize a flash drive. It turned out to be Jack’s problem.

Even worse than having Windows not recognize the flash drive when you plug it in, this problem can actually cost you all the data that was already on the flash drive.

Read more in my Terry’s Computer Tips article Flash Drive Not Recognized.
XP Repair Pro

How to Write Articles and Books, Easily and Quickly

Well, this is only marginally PC Repair info-related, but it will give you a good idea HOW I manage to write as many articles as I write for my sites and newsletters…

As you may or may not know, I write two newsletters and also blog entries for a number of different blogs. Most are computer-related in some way.

I stumbled across something incredible recently. On one of the mailing lists I receive, there was an article about Steve Manning’s free email course and his book that teach you how to write a book, quickly, easily and creatively.

Just about everyone wants to, or dreams of, writing a book. But they just don’t have the time, or the skill or the direction that will make it possible for them.

Whether they want to do write it for profit, or as an outlet for their creativity, or to share information with others, or to entertain others, or just to see if they can do it (they can!), most people have a deep-seated desire to write.

I checked out Steve’s site and was very impressed. Unlike the glitzy sites that offer fluff and no content, Steve offered a free email course. He also had a bunch of articles, too, that helped me focus on writing.

The most amazing thing was that I found, in Steve’s guides, was not a new concept of writing, but was a method of writing discipline similar to that which I have developed for writing my newsletters and sites’ articles. But, Steve’s course is presented in a progression of logical steps and topics.

While I view my writing style as short, intense bursts of writing, Steve guides his readers — and prods his readers — to write by issuing challenges that we really want to complete. By exercising our writing skills, we develop our writing skills…

If you want to write a book, write a novel, write a short story, write an article, write a newsletter — if you want to write anything — I urge you to sign up for Steve Manning’s free email course “How YOU can Write Your Book On Anything in 14 Days or Less… Guaranteed! –An Expert’s Step-by-Step Guide”