There are two major factors in play here: search leakage and search history.

Search leakage is what happens when you do a search, and the search term that you used is passed on to the site that you clicked on from the search results.

For example, when you do a search for the phrase “cancer symptoms” and click on a particular site, such as WebMD, that site knows the phrase you were searching.  That in itself would not be so bad…except for the fact that whenever you visit any website your computer reveals your IP address and other information that can be traced back to you individually.  So that means somewhere out there your name could be connected with the phrase “cancer symptoms”.

Search history relates to the Google example above, where they keep a record of the searches you have done (and almost all search engines keep track of that).

When you search on a word or phrase, your computer’s IP address is revealed and this means that the search being done could be related to you.  If you are logged in to your Google account at the time, then that search IS directly related to you.

Many search engines keep track of your search history in order to serve up more targeted advertising.  This has been the standard procedure for a long time.  If I search to find information on various running shoes, Google is going to start showing me ads from shoe manufacturers.

The big problem comes up when the search history is released.  This release could be accidental (such as when a search engine server gets hacked and the data is revealed to outside parties or the public in general).  Or the release could be a legal requirement, such as when law enforcement subpoenas the information as part of an investigation.

What if you are an aspiring writer, doing some research for your first novel – a murder mystery.  You might have some suspicious-looking searches in your history, such as:

• untraceable murder weapons
• assassination cases
• how to hide a body
• crime scene investigation procedures

These are probably not things you would want investigators to find if they happen to get your search history! There’s an easy way to search on the internet.  It’s a search engine called DuckDuckGo (http://www.duckduckgo.com).

DuckDuckGo takes care of both of the privacy problems I mentioned above. When you do a search on DuckDuckGo, there is no search leakage.  They redirect your search to Google, Bing, Yahoo, Wikipedia, Wolfram Alpha and others, but they do not pass along the search terms that were used to create those results.  So you are actually getting more results than if you just searched on a single one of those, such as Google.  And the search engine won’t know what term you were searching on.

Regarding search history, it is true that the government or law enforcement agencies can require search engines to turn over the search history for any given user.  However, the search engines are not required to keep that search history in the first place.  Since DuckDuckGo does not retain any of your search history, they have nothing to turn over to the government or any other agency. This also means that if their servers are hacked into or otherwise compromised, your search history won’t be on display for the world to see – because there is no search history being stored. DuckDuckGo was just started in 2008, and their search traffic tends to rise whenever the news has stories about online privacy invasion.  Not surprisingly, this past week was their best week ever in terms of website traffic.  It seems that we the people are becoming less and less tolerant of the government sticking its nose in every nook and cranny of our lives when it has no legitimate reason for doing so.

And of course, my disclaimer: we are learning new information about secret surveillance almost daily.  Is it possible that, even though this search engine doesn’t leak your search terms or store your search history, some government agency might already have the technology to track all of your searches anyway?  Yes, I would say that is possible.  In fact, I would even say it is quite probable.  So if you are going to do any searches that could be embarrassing if made public, make sure you do it on your friend’s computer instead of your own!

Fortunately a lot of websites these days have a search function displayed right on the home page.  That makes it easy.  But what if there is no site search offered?

You just use a special search in Google.  This is basically a regular Google search, but you have to make sure Google knows to only search on this one particular site.  To do that, the search would look like this:

site:websitename.com searchword

So if you wanted to search the NFL website for any mention of the name “Buccaneers”, it would look like this:

Go ahead and do that search in Google.  You will see that the results match the search.  Every page listed in the results contains the word “buccaneers”, and every page in the results is from the NFL.com website.  No other websites are included:

The disadvantage of this type of search is that it depends on Google having indexed every page on the site.  This means that if the site just posted a new page or blog post an hour ago, Google probably has not yet seen that page – so it would not be included in the search results.

There is an alternative type of search that is site-specific but I’m not sure it would work on all websites.  It doesn’t depend on Google’s indexing function at all because it doesn’t use Google.  Doing it this way, you just go to the address bar at the top of the screen, and enter the actual address of the site you wish to search, and follow it with a short suffix.  The suffix is:

/?s=searchword

For example, if you wanted to search my site for any page that mentions the word “backup” you would enter this into the address bar and hit Enter:

http://computertutorflorida.com/?s=backup

If you do this on my site, you will see that there are 30 blog posts that come up that mention the word “backup” at least one time.

This second method I believe would work fine on smaller blog sites such as mine, but not as well on the more complex sites like the NFL website.

But here’s something you might not be aware of – if you’re part of a particular group of people – a certain “club” so to speak – you can actually borrow one book per month.  So you can read books without purchasing them!  Currently there are over 350k books available for borrowing from Amazon’s huge inventory (the actual number changes all the time).

In order to be eligible for borrowing books for your Kindle, you must be a member of Amazon Prime.  I joined Prime a while ago because it just made financial sense.  Amazon Prime costs $75 per year.  Here are the major benefits:

What we’re looking at today is the opportunity to borrow books for your Kindle for free.  And these aren’t just old, dusty books that no one wants any more – these are popular books from all genres and categories.

Here’s the problem:  Amazon doesn’t make it easy to find the list of books available for borrowing.  Obviously, they would much rather you purchase a book, since that is how they make money.  So today I’m going to show you how to find that list of books to borrow.

Basically, you need to go to Amazon’s book section.  Then you need to filter out all of the books available with Amazon Prime benefits.  Then, from that selection, you need to filter out all of the Kindle books.  To make it easy, I made this video so you can see me doing it (see it bigger by clicking on the “Full screen” icon in the lower right corner):

To borrow these books, you do need to be an Amazon Prime member.  And, any books that are borrowed must be read on a Kindle device such as the Kindle reader or Kindle Fire tablet.

First, a quick review – what is defragging?

“Defrag” is short for “defragmentation” – which is what your hard drive needs when it becomes fragmented.  Over time, as all the different programs on your computer call upon the hard drive for data, the bits of data become less and less “organized” – that means the drive space is being used inefficiently, and some space is wasted.  Obviously, this is not optimal.

When you defragment your drive, you are basically just reorganizing the data so that it can be accessed by each of the programs more efficiently.  So everything should operate a little more smoothly.

With that being said, defragging isn’t the “magic pill” that a lot of people imagine it to be.  There are a lot of other things you can do in order to optimize your computer.  But, it’s still good to make sure your drive is overly fragmented.

So if defragging is a good thing, why don’t you have to worry about it any more?

Because it is probably already being done on a regular basis anyway.

If you are using Windows Vista, Windows 7, or Windows 8, the defrag process is most likely one of the tasks that is already being performed.  Here’s how to check it:

1. Open “Computer” (you can do this with the keyboard shortcut Windows key + E)

2. Right click on the C drive and choose Properties

3. Click on Tools, then click on “Defragment now” (in Windows 8, click on the “Optimize” button)

Here is what you will probably see:

As you can see, mine is scheduled to run at 1 am every Wednesday.  I did not set it to do that – Windows was already set up that way.  Since it runs on its own every week, I never have to remember to do it.  And it’s apparently working – my drives have 0% fragmentation.

You can click the “Configure Schedule” button to set the defrag process to happen at whatever time you want, on whatever day of the week.  I just like for stuff like that to happen overnight when I am probably not using the computer.

One final note – if you are still using Windows XP, defragging is not scheduled by default.  But if your computer is running XP, defragging is the least of your worries – you need to upgrade to Windows 7 (in most cases, it’s now time to replace that computer with a newer one).

Here’s the deal.  I have 6 different websites that opened up automatically each time I opened Firefox.  These are the standard set of websites that I viewed daily.  That set of 6 sites is what Firefox considered to be my “home page”.  I knew I could always close all the tabs except one, hit the “Home Page” icon, and I would be looking at my set of 6 websites.

Chrome doesn’t work exactly the same way.

With Chrome, I can still go into Settings and tell it my 6 websites that I want to open up in 6 tabs every time I open Chrome fresh.  But if I already have Chrome open in one window, I cannot open those 6 “home page” sites in another window.  If I hit the Home Page icon, it just opens to a new blank page – no website at all.  The only way to get those home pages back, one in each tab, was to close Chrome completely and open it fresh.  Sometimes that was inconvenient.

I went hunting around for a solution, and someone on an online forum tipped me off about this great Chrome extension called Daily Links.  It does exactly what I need it to do.  To get it, click on Chrome’s “Customize and Control” icon, then click on Tools – Extensions.  Search for Daily Links and click to add it to Chrome.

Here’s how it works:

Find Daily Links in your list of Chrome extensions, and click on Options.  You will see a few different things to configure:

Now you need to add the website address (URL) for each page you want to display in a tab.  Just type in the URL (or click on Select Bookmarks and choose from there) and click “Add”.  You can add as many as you want, but don’t go too crazy – 20 websites loading at the same time means they will all load pretty slowly.

Here’s the cool part – you can customize the listing so that certain sites only show up on particular days.

For example, I subscribe to a certain YouTube channel that puts out a new video every Monday.  So I have that one included in my links for Mondays, but not any other day – why open a website when the content will not be new for another week?

Or, if you have a comic strip site that has new content on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, you could have that site only show up on those days.  Your list of sites would look something like this:

The green arrows are there so that you can move a site up or down the list based on priority, so the sites show up in the order you prefer.  And of course the red X deletes a site from the list completely.

In most browsers you can do something similar by creating a folder on your Bookmarks toolbar, filling it with shortcuts to your favorite websites, then right click on the folder and choose “Open in tabs” or something similar.  But that doesn’t give you the day-specific option (unless you create a different folder for each day – and that sounds like a lot of work).

Now that I am using Chrome more than ever, I will probably be finding more cool things you can do with it.  What do you like or dislike about Chrome?  Have you found any great extensions for it?

How many pixels are actually on a screen?  Here’s how to figure it out.

Do a right-click on an open area of your desktop, and choose “Screen resolution” (if you are on XP or Vista, go to Control Panel and open the Display settings).

The screen resolution will read something like 1024 x 768 or 1280 x 1024 or something similar.  If you multiply those two numbers, that gives you the total number of pixels on your screen.  In my case, I use two 19 inch monitors and each one is 1280 x 1024, so each one has 1,310,720 pixels at that resolution.  To give you an idea of how tiny they are, that means my monitors have over 7000 pixels per square inch.  That’s pretty small!

So now you know what a pixel is, and that you have lots of them.  But don’t get too attached, because they sometimes unfortunately die.  In many cases, a single pixel can die even though it is surrounded on all sides by pixels that are still completely alive.

A pixel can die from a variety of causes because they are fairly sensitive – being touched with too much pressure, being dropped, even a pesky dust particle can be a problem for a pixel.  And if your screen has a wallpaper that uses a mix of colors and patterns, a dead pixel might not even be noticeable.  Even if you do notice a dead one, or a few, you might make the deliberate decision that it’s not worth it to replace the whole monitor since it still works okay otherwise.

But when you are buying a monitor – or even more importantly, when you are buying a laptop – you want to check the screen and see that all of the pixels are alive and kicking.

I used to check for dead pixels by going into the settings and changing the Windows background to all white, then telling the computer to not show the icons on the desktop.  That procedure was okay, but I have since discovered a better way.

There is a website that is designed for this, and it is very simple to use.  It is called “Do I Have a Dead Pixel?” (DoIHaveADeadPixel.com).

When you go there, you will see how easy it is.  You just choose the background color you want to use:

Then hit the F11 key on the keyboard so that the web browser is expanded to full screen.  Look closely at the screen for anything that doesn’t seem to belong there, then when you’re finished just tap the F11 once again to bring back the browser toolbars and menus.

This site is especially handy if you are buying a used monitor or a used laptop, to make sure the screen is in good working condition.  And if you order a display online, you should check it for any dead pixels immediately when it gets delivered to you.  Some manufacturers allow up to a certain number of dead pixels as “acceptable” and would not consider a display within those limits to be defective.  However, if you catch it immediately upon receipt, you can use the retailer’s standard return policy to get a different one.  Return policies vary but are usually 14 to 30 days.

Here’s the formula (don’t worry if you don’t understand it immediately; I’ll explain):

1. Create a Facebook fan page (it can be about a specific topic, or just a general one)

2. Generate traffic to this page – first through Facebook advertising, then viral marketing

3. When the page gets lots of fans/Likes (as in more than 10k), sell it

But then, there’s the obvious question: why would anyone buy a Facebook page?  How does it have any value?

To answer that question, we need to look at the money-making process in reverse.

The way a lot of websites make money is through what are called affiliate programs.  An affiliate program means that you can sell a company’s products on your website, and you get a commission for every sale.

So let’s say there’s a website where people can go to bet on football.  You apply to be an affiliate of that website.  Then you make a football-related website of your own, and you put ads on your site that link to the betting site.  When someone clicks on one of those ads, goes to the betting website, and creates an account, you get a percentage of what they spend.  If the gambler sets up an account with a deposit of $1000, and you make a 30% commission, you just made $300.

Sounds great, right?  Just make a simple website about football, and make a bunch of money!  Well, it’s not quite that easy.  You don’t make any money unless people go to your website.  In fact, you need a LOT of people to go to your website because only a very small percentage of them will click on the ads.

So… your problem is that you need to be able to contact a large number of people and get them to visit your website.  How do you do that?  In the old days, you could buy a list of email addresses and just spam 10,000 inboxes with your message.  Can’t do that now (at least not easily).

But what if you had a Facebook fan page that was, for example, about the game of poker?  You could have stories about the pro players, videos of tournaments, all kinds of stuff.  If you could somehow get that Facebook page to have 10,000 fans, that means you have a large group of people that will see whatever you post on that page.  In a sense, you have “control” over that group of fans.  You could make a post every once in a while with a link to your football betting website, and a lot of those people would click through and visit your site.  And a certain percentage will click on the ad and you make money.

So… now the problem is how do you get a Facebook page that has 10,000 fans?  One way is that you could buy one.  Can you see now that a Facebook fan page with lots of fans has value? That’s why there are posts like these on online forums:

That’s the motivation for people to build these pages and get lots of likes and shares – so they can sell them.  There’s even a whole website devoted to buying and selling Facebook pages (sellyourfanpage.com):

So finally, the last issue is… how do you get lots of people to like and share your content?  That’s where the fake pictures and hoaxes come into play.

The people that are good at this figured out long ago that the key is to post something that generates a lot of emotion.  Positive or negative emotion doesn’t matter – it just has to be something that will get people’s attention and spur them to action.  Of course, the desired action is to like it and share it with all of their friends as well.

Here are some of the images that are designed to get people either mad enough or happy enough to share with their Facebook friends:

This one doesn’t rely on rage or laughter to make people share it – just curiosity. It works – over 3000 shares, 26k likes:

How low will these guys go?  This exploits a seriously ill child just to build up likes and shares for a page:

Here’s one that capitalizes on the recent bombing at the Boston Marathon (the story next to the picture is false of course, but sympathetic people that don’t research it will often automatically share it):

Here’s one that is so obviously fake, but it will often be accompanied by a message that says, “Not sure if this is true or not, but worth a try!” (trust me, it’s not worth a try) -

This one is one of the most-shared hoax photos on Facebook.  This guy held up a “winning” lottery ticket and asked people to share the photo, and he would send a million dollars to a random person that shared it.  Of course, the picture was photoshopped because the ticket was not really a winner.  However, the photo was shared over 2 million times:

For pictures, really any subject matter will do.  Political issues such as gun control or abortion will usually work nicely to get people fired up.

Oh, and in case you were wondering why I included the picture of Morgan Freeman at the top of this post – a widely-shared post is one that claims that he has died.  He is still very much alive, but these “announcements” about his death continue to circulate because people continue to share things without checking to see if they are really true.  Sad thing is, when he does actually pass away, no one will believe it.

What should you do?

If you see one of these stupid things on Facebook, just delete it from your news feed.  You could try to tell the person that posted it that it’s fake, but that’s usually an exercise in futility.  You could also just give them a link to this page and hopefully they will become more aware.

If you see something on Facebook that sounds crazy, but you think it might actually be true, it’s still almost certainly false.  In any event, do not Like or Share it until you have researched it and confirmed that it is actually true.  These will be very rare.  It’s usually safer to read something on Facebook, assume it’s false, and move on.

Take a look at the image above.  If you have Windows Vista, Windows 7, or Windows 8, this image will pop up on your screen whenever you click on something that could make changes to your computer.  This includes installation of any program, and sometimes just running a program will cause the warning to appear.

What is the purpose of UAC?  It was introduced with Windows Vista as an added security measure.  Theoretically, if some program starts up that could make some changes to your computer, this warning window would provide a layer of security by requiring you to click “Yes” to continue and allow whatever was trying to run.

That’s a great theory, but I have watched what a lot of people do when it comes up on the screen.  They just click Yes automatically, as quickly as they click “Accept” or “I agree” when installing a program.  When it is automatically approved every time anyway, it is nothing more than an inconvenience.

Of course, Microsoft encourages you to leave it turned on.  And why wouldn’t they – they certainly aren’t the ones that have to click it every time you want to do something on your computer!  I would bet that it’s pretty likely most of the people at Microsoft have turned it off too.

If I set up your computer originally, you probably don’t know what I’m talking about because you have never seen it come up – because I already turned it off as part of the setup procedure.  But if you do see it sometimes and are tired of having to click Yes to give it permission to do something, here’s how to turn it off:

Windows XP: User Account Control wasn’t introduced until Vista, so XP computers don’t even have it as an option.

Windows Vista: Click the Start button and click on Control Panel.  Click on “User Accounts and Family Safety”, then click on “User Accounts”.  Click on “Turn User Account Control on or off”.  On the next screen, uncheck the box that enables UAC.  Click OK, and you will be prompted to reboot the computer.  You can reboot later if you want, but the UAC change won’t be in effect until you reboot.

Windows 7: Click the Start button and in the search field type UAC and click the Enter key on the keyboard.  On the next screen, slide the slidebar all the way to the bottom and click OK.  You will be prompted to reboot the computer.  You can reboot later if you want, but the UAC change won’t be in effect until you reboot.

Windows 8: At the Start screen, move the cursor to the top right corner so that the charms bar comes out on the right side.  Click on the search icon (looks like a magnifying glass) and in the search field, type MSCONFIG and hit Enter on the keyboard.  Click the Tools tab.  Click once to highlight “Change UAC Settings” and click Launch.  Slide the slidebar all the way to the bottom and click OK.  Click Yes to confirm.

Not true.

Your computer has value to a cyber-criminal in a variety of different ways that you might not even be aware of.

Here are a few things the bad guys could do with your computer:

1. Using your online buying and selling accounts
Before you say, “I really don’t do much of that” think about purchases you have made in the past.  If you have ever purchased anything through Barnes and Noble’s website, Amazon, eBay, or any other online retailer, you have an account there.  A lot of these companies even offer the convenience of storing your payment information in their servers, so that you can make purchases without typing out your credit card number each time (like Amazon’s “One Click” ordering process).

How this could be used:  The thief could log in to your eBay account.  First thing he would do is change the email address on file, so that any notifications would go to an email account that he controls (so you don’t see that anything is happening).  He then sets up a fake auction for an expensive item along with instructions that payment gets sent to him, not to you as the eBay account owner.  It’s even better for him if you have had the account for a while and built up a good positive feedback rating.  But when people have paid and then don’t receive their item, they will be coming to you for an explanation.

2. Using your email
Oh, you only use your email for chatting with friends and family, right?  You would never send any confidential or critical information by email, since it’s not secure.  But what if someone with malicious intentions got control of your account?  Anything that got sent out would seem, for all intents and purposes, to be coming from you.

How this could be used: Think about all the people in your email contacts list – friends, children, other family members, co-workers, other people.  What if you sent every one of them an “emergency” email, explaining that you are stranded somewhere (even in another country), you had your cash stolen, and you just need a few hundred dollars to check out of your hotel and get back home.  Probably most of them would know that something was amiss.  But this is actually a common scam, and a certain percentage of recipients fall for it.  They send the money via Western Union, the scammer collects it, and that cash is gone forever.

3. Using your credit card/debit card info
You might be very careful to instruct the online stores where you shop to NOT store your credit card information.  You make sure to not keep your card numbers saved on any documents in your computer.  These are what some people see as obvious precautions to take.  But without proper protection, your card info is still at risk.

How this could be used:  Obviously we know that if someone gets your credit card information, it can be used to make fraudulent purchases or cash advances (at least until you discover it and report it).  But how would they get this information?  Keylogger software.  A keylogger runs silently in the background, recording every keystroke you make on your computer.  So when you type in your credit card number, it is stored and sent back to whoever had the keylogger program installed.  That’s when the shopping spree begins!

4. Using your computer for a DDoS attack
“DDoS” is an acronym for Distributed Denial of Service.  When you have this little malware program installed on your computer, you don’t even see it running – in fact, your computer appears to be functioning fine.  But on command, that software can direct your computer to visit a particular website on a specific day and time.  You probably wouldn’t notice anything happening then either.

How this could be used: You know how sometimes you go to a website and if it’s a really busy time of day and a lot of other people are visiting the same site, the website becomes really slow?   This is sort of the same process that criminals use to overwhelm a website with so much traffic that it breaks and is no longer working on the web.  So how do they send all that traffic to a particular website?  By having their little program secretly installed and running on hundreds of thousands of computers.  When all of those computers go to the same website at the same time, the site can’t handle it and just shuts down (computers like that are called “Zombies” or “bots”, and the group as a whole is commonly referred to as a “botnet”).  Your computer could be a part of that and you might never know it.

5. Using your computer for illegal purposes
It’s not pleasant to talk about, but your computer is capable of accessing things that you would never want to be involved with.  If someone wants to get into activities that are completely illegal, they obviously would not want to use their own computer because it could eventually lead back to them getting caught.  If they have control of your computer, they can use it instead – so the authorities come knocking on your door with a few questions for you to answer.

How this could be used: If the FBI came to you with evidence that your computer’s IP address was used in distributing or selling child porn, what would your response be?  “Oh no, Mr. FBI Agent – there has been some mistake!  My computer has not been used for that!”  Or the scenario could include illegal gambling activity, maybe some threats to assassinate a public official, or plans to commit a terrorist act.  If any of this is traced to your computer, you will be faced with the expense of hiring a lawyer just to defend yourself.

How do you prevent your computer from being infiltrated by any of this?  Proper security software, and good habits.

For security software, I use and recommend 2 primary programs:

1. My antivirus program is Microsoft Security Essentials.  Get it here.  It’s free and does a great job.

2. My antispyware program is Malwarebytes – the paid version, not the free version.  Get it here.  It will run all the time, blocking a lot of bad stuff from coming in to your computer, and also blocking you from inadvertently visiting a malicious site that will infect your computer.

As far as “good habits”, that is mostly common sense.  Don’t click on a link unless you know where it will take you.  Don’t download something free from the internet unless you know it is legitimate.  Don’t let any downloaded software install anything “extra” that you weren’t looking for originally.  As a general rule of thumb, if you search Google for “free” anything, you will not be happy with the results.

Chances are you are already familiar with Craigslist (Craigslist.org).  It is the largest and most widely used classified ad site on the internet.  If you want to buy and sell something locally, don’t bother with a newspaper ad – just list it on Craigslist.  That’s where most people look first now anyway.

Craigslist gets a LOT of traffic.  That’s great if you are selling something because it means a lot of people will see your ad, and there’s a great chance you will sell your item.  If you have it priced competitively, you will probably have several people wanting to buy it.

If you are a buyer looking for a bargain on a particular item, it can be a little tricky.  Even frustrating.  There are definitely a lot of bargains on there.  Why the bargains?  A few reasons:

• The seller might be selling furniture that has to be out of the house in the next 2 days, so they will sell it for whatever price they can get even if it is really worth more.
• The seller might be in dire financial straits, and just needs to raise some quick cash so is willing to sell something at a big discount in order to have money for rent or another pressing bill coming due.
• The seller might have inherited some items that are unwanted, and just wants to get rid of them without caring about how much money they bring in.  Or they are just tired of looking at these things sitting in their garage.

Whatever the reason, the bargains are definitely there just about every day in many categories.  But for the REAL bargains, they are likely to be already sold by the time you see the ad.

Here’s an example:

Let’s say you are looking for a used car.  You know you want to only buy it from a private owner (rather than a dealer), you know you want it to be a Honda Civic, and you want it to be under $5000.  You also only want to see ads that include pictures.

You can put all of those specifics into your Craigslist search, and look at the results…

BUT

… those are only current as of this moment.  People with cars to sell post new ads all the time.  What if someone posts an ad an hour later, and it’s the perfect car for you at an amazing price – but you don’t check Craigslist until the next day, and by then it’s already sold?  Obviously you can’t check Craigslist for new posts that match this search every hour around the clock.  But your computer can!

Actually, it would not technically be YOUR computer that is checking Craigslist.  What you would be using is a free service called Blogtrottr.  You just need to sign up for a free account at blogtrottr.com.

Blogtrottr is sort of your “Craigslist slave” that never takes a break.  After you have created your account, you have the opportunity to tell it what you want to monitor – that’s the link that says “subscribe to a new feed”.  You just copy and paste the URL from your Craigslist search results, and tell it how often you want to get updates (such as every few hours or just once a day).  For me, if I am searching for a great deal on Craigslist, I set it to check every hour.  If it comes up with a new listing, you get an email.  So it helps if you get email on your phone, in case you don’t happen to be at your computer at the time.

I love this because it gives me a huge advantage over  most of the other bargain-hunters on Craigslist.  If I can know about a great deal as soon as it get posted, I can beat the others to it.  Information is very powerful!

Of course, you can use Blogtrottr for monitoring sites other than Craigslist.  For example, you could get an email notification any time a certain blog site gets a new post.  Or if a news site posts a new article containing the name of your city.  Maybe you want to know whenever an item pertaining to a particular celebrity is listed for sale on eBay.  The possibilities are endless.

How are YOU going to use Blogtrottr?  Put it in the comments!

http://blogtrottr.com/subscriptions/

1. Shopping for birthday or Christmas gifts:If other people in your family have access to your computer, that means they can pretty easily go into your web browsing history and see what shopping sites you have visited.  So if it’s 2 weeks before your wife’s birthday, and she sees that you have just visited half a dozen jewelry company websites, it wouldn’t be too hard for her to figure out what you’re planning.

2. Using someone else’s computer
If you are visiting a friend or relative, you might use their home computer to log into your email or Facebook account.  What if they have their computer set to automatically remember all user names and passwords for any logins?  Even if this is someone you trust, there is really no reason for their computer to be able to log in to your accounts.

3. Buying airline tickets
This one is a bit controversial.  Maybe this has happened to you.  You decide to take a trip, so you shop around and get some prices for airline tickets for certain dates, but you don’t buy the tickets right away.  The next day you check on the same dates, and the prices are higher.  Some people say that the airlines put a little cookie on your computer so they know that you are interested in certain dates, and then they intentionally display higher prices when you come back, to encourage you to buy immediately before they go any higher.  Whether or not that really happens is debatable – but if you search for tickets in “Private” mode, you don’t have to wonder about it.

4. Facebook
If there was ever an award for a website that tracks private information, I think Facebook would win that one easily (although Google would probably be a close second).  If you don’t want Facebook to track your website habits or put cookies on your computer, just go Incognito.  Of course, that doesn’t help much if you still go to Facebook and manually enter all of your personal information anyway.

5. Checking your website’s Google rankings
Sometimes I will go to Google and do a search on a phrase that pertains to my computer business, to see how well my website is ranking.  For example, I might type in “personal computer instruction” and see that it comes up at the top of the search results.  However, sometimes when that happens it is because I am logged in with my Google account and it is just showing me results that pertain to my account.  So I try the same search in “Private” mode and it shows me the “real” results.  In this case, my site comes up first for that search anyway, but you get the idea.

6. Browsing on your work computer
A lot of employers are becoming more tolerant about employees visiting non-work related websites sometimes during the day.  Still, if you are on a break and browsing Facebook or checking your email, you don’t necessarily want to leave your login information or your website history on your work computer.

7. Public computers
This one is a no-brainer.  If you are using a computer that is available to the general public, such as one at a library or university, you don’t want any history or tracking to be possible.  I’ve seen reports of someone going into a store like Best Buy, and signing into their Facebook account.  Then they leave the store, and someone else looks at that computer and realizes they can still be on Facebook.  Now, the way it is supposed to happen is when you sign out you should be required to enter a password to sign back in.  But it might not always work that way.  In fact, the better thing is to not sign into Facebook on a computer that is on display for sale to start with.

So there are obviously some very good reasons for browsing the internet without leaving a trail of cookies behind you.  The next question is – how do you do it?  It’s really easy actually.  Here are the steps to open a new private window for the popular web browsers.

To start private browsing in Firefox:  click Tools, then Start Private Browsing (or Ctrl + Shift + P)

To browse privately in Internet Explorer: click Tools, then click InPrivate browsing (or Ctrl + Shift + P)

To go Incognito in Chrome: click the Control icon (the 3 short horizontal lines in the top right), then click New Incognito Window (or Ctrl + Shift + N)

To privately browse in Safari: click the Safari tab, then click Private Browsing

Whatever your reason for wanting to visit websites privately, remember that even if you are browsing in “Private” mode, you are still entering your information in a computer that is on the internet and connecting with other computers.  No one can 100% guarantee that what you are doing is private.  Sometimes a little paranoia can be a good thing.

You get a call from someone claiming to be with “Microsoft” or from “Windows” and they tell you that your computer has been reporting some problems and viruses, so they need to just log in and check it for you.  The reality is that they are probably calling from an internet cafe like the one pictured above, just trying to “reel in” their next victim.

Of course, the end goal for the “tech” is to get the victim to pull out their credit card and pay for this “service”.  They will find all kinds of viruses and infections on the computer (that aren’t really there) in order to instill fear in the mind of the owner, and unfortunately a lot of people fall for it.

Recently I found one of these scam companies and contacted them, posing as a customer whose computer was running too slowly (probably the most common complaint any tech hears).  I was told I would get a call back in about 10 minutes, and that is what happened.

I was ready for that call – I recorded the audio of the call, as well as what was happening on my computer screen when I allowed the scammer to log in.

One thing to keep in mind, as you hear the “tech” talk about all the infections in my computer – this was a computer that is completely clean.  There were no infections in it whatsoever.

Here are some things to notice in the video:

:10 – He identifies himself as being from the Technical Department from Windows Service Center from Microtech (lots of official-sounding names, signifying nothing).

:44 – He tells me my computer has infections before he even connects to it.

1:46 – For some reason he wanted to show me the Wikipedia entry for “Koobface”, the virus he claimed was infecting my computer.  Apparently this was supposed to be proof of some sort.

2:05 – This is where he wants to show me the infected files.  So he clicks Start – Run and then does a search for inf infection.  All this does is bring up files and folders that contain either of those terms.  This is a clever misdirect because it is a totally meaningless search.  Lots of files will match that search.  For example, any file that has the word “information” will come up as a match, because it contains “inf”.  So of course lots of files and folders come up when he does this.

When the search results came up, here is how he described them:

“These are the files and folders with the help of which your Windows 7 works and runs.  If one of the files has been highly corrupted, then on a chain basis all the files will be corrupted.  And for that reason the computer might can stop working.  Or it might can crash at any point of time.”

At this point, I’m wondering – if all my Windows files are corrupted, how is the computer running right now?

3:05 – He says he will try to open one of the files, and if Windows cannot open the file then that means it is corrupted.  This is another clever ruse.  The file he tries to open is “acpi.PNF”.  This is a Windows system file (that’s why it is in the Windows folder).  It is not meant to be opened and viewed because there is no program associated with the .PNF extension.  In other words, if the file was “acpi.doc”, the computer knows that all .DOC files get opened with Word.  For a file that ends with .PNF, there is no program to open it.  So of course it doesn’t open, and he points to that as “proof” that the file is corrupted.

4:05 – I asked him what is the difference between a “virus” and an “infection”.  His response:

“A virus is a very common thing.  It always pops up right in front of your desktop screen stating that you have a virus in your computer.  Now the online infections are always in a hidden format, corrupting your system, which you know your computer might suddenly stop working or suddenly might crash.  And this cannot be defended by any kind of antivirus in your computer, like Norton, AVG, McAfee, or CyberDefender, whatever you use. They cannot go ahead and protect you and save your computer.”

The guy was a smooth talker, but his words were utter nonsense.

4:50 – Now he will try to open that same file, but he will force it to open in Notepad (Windows plain text editor).  Since the file is not designed to be opened or viewed, what shows on the screen looks like random gibberish:

I of course, playing the unknowing newbie, expressed shock at that.  He told me these were “the infections that are on each and every file on my computer in a hidden format”.  It really was laughable what he was asking me to believe.  Unfortunately, a lot of people do fall for it.

6:10 – For his final proof that my computer is fully infected, he claims he is about to do a “Windows internal scan”.  This is another move that I have to give him a little bit of credit for – it’s pretty clever.

He types Run – then CMD and Enter.  This brings up what is called the Command Prompt.  It is just something that looks like the old DOS windows on older machines.  He says this is where he will do the “scan”.  On HIS computer (which I cannot see), he has a large text file which he COPIES (to his clipboard).  Then on MY screen, he quickly does a right-click and PASTE – so that large text file starts scrolling up the screen.  It does look like a scan, but it is nothing more than just the text he pasted.

When the “scan” is done, guess what – the text all turned RED.  I guess that was to make it look infected, and it really did look scary!  Of course, if you look near the bottom of the window, there is a command: “color c“.  Whenever that command is entered at a command prompt, it turns the text red.  Obviously not something the average person would know, so the scammer doesn’t even care that it is sitting right there in front of me in plain sight.

The last line of that window stated that my system damage was 80%, and that my “security warranty” had expired.  Apparently this was how all those nasty infections invaded my poor computer.  Funny thing is, “security warranty” is just a vague mumbo-jumbo term and there really is no such thing that needs to be “renewed” in Windows.  But that is what he wants me to buy.

11:15 – Finally he goes for the close.  He quotes me the pricing for renewing this imaginary security license:

For 2 years: $299

For 3 years: $374

For my lifetime: $549 (Note: this is not the lifetime of the computer.  It is for the rest of MY life.  And this covers any computer I might buy in the future, and any other computer in my house.  Any computer problems will be repaired at no cost.  Obviously he wants to make the most expensive option also appear to be the best value.  But this proposal is about as far-fetched as anything he has told me so far.)

14:00 – The call came to an end in a way that you would never guess.  You just have to listen to it.

These guys obviously have things down to a science with this scam.  There is one big factor that makes this scam different from a lot of other ones.  With most online scams, at some point the victim figures out that he’s been scammed, then there’s no way to get the money back because you usually pay cash or Western Union which is never recoverable.  In this case, you pay with a credit card.  So wouldn’t you think the scammers would have a problem with their victims complaining and contesting the charge when they find out they got scammed?  But it’s not a problem for them for this one reason: the victim never realizes he was scammed.  He pays his money, the scammer “fixes” the computer and does another fake scan, and this time the text all comes up white instead of red.  So that must mean it got fixed!  So since the victim doesn’t know any better, he thinks he just bought something of value, and does not complain.  Gotta hand it to these guys, they have figured out a way to part people from their money.

Have you had a call like this?  How was it different?  I would love to hear what your experience was.

The way to fix this problem really depends on which web browser you are using, since each one has its own configuration options and settings.  HOWEVER… one thing to keep in mind is that the real solution to this problem is not changing your web browser to remember your stuff.  More on that at the end.  I am just answering this question because I get asked it sometimes – most recently by my friend Darla (you can hear her ask the question on my podcast today).

Whatever web browser you use, it has the built-in option to remember information that you enter into online forms.  This can include your user name, your email (and for many websites, your email IS your user name), your password, even in some cases your actual name and address and other information.

This is only if the website allows it.  You might notice some websites that don’t have a little check box that says “remember me”.  This is usually for security reasons, so a lot of banking websites are like that.  They don’t want Internet Explorer storing all of the information about how to get into your checking account, even though as a home user you might not have a concern about it.

I am going to cover the steps needed for Internet Explorer, Firefox and Chrome since those are the 3 most popular web browsers.

Internet Explorer (version 10):

Click on Tools – Internet Options and under the “General” tab, UNcheck the box that says “Delete browsing history on exit”.  Then click Apply.

Next, click on the “Content” tab.  Find the “Autocomplete” section and click the Settings button.  Here, you can choose what you want the browser to remember.  You can see there is a specific option for remembering user names and passwords on forms.  Check the appropriate boxes and click OK, then OK again to close the Internet Options box.

Firefox (version 19)

By default, Firefox will offer to remember your passwords.  However, at some point you may have turned off that feature either for a particular website or just in general.  The actual steps may be different, but the underlying process to fix this is very similar to what we did for Internet Explorer.

Click Tools – Options and then click on the Privacy tab.  Look at the “Firefox will:” setting and use the drop-down menu to choose “Use custom settings for history”.  Then in the new section that appears, make sure “Remember search and form history” is checked.

Before closing that window, look at the check box next to “Clear history when Firefox closes”.  If it is unchecked, you’re fine.  If it is checked, click on Settings and make sure in the new window that “Saved Passwords” is NOT checked.  In other words, you will have Firefox clear your web browsing history but it will still keep your saved passwords.

Now for part 2 – click on the Security tab (in the Options window that is still open).  Check “Remember passwords for sites”.  If it is already checked, click on “Exceptions” and make sure none of the sites listed there are ones that you want to have it remember.  Click OK to close out all windows.

Chrome (version 25)

Click on the Chrome icon in the top right corner (the 3 short horizontal lines) and in the new menu, click on Settings.  Scroll down and click on “Show Advanced settings” and scroll down to the “Passwords and forms” section.  Check the box that says “Offer to save passwords I enter on the web.”

Now click on “Manage saved passwords” and in the new window look in the “Never saved” list.  If you want Chrome to remember the password for any of the sites listed there, mouse over the address and then click on the X at the right end of the line.

Now – having given you all those instructions for each of those web browsers, I will say once again that it is not ideal to have your web browser remember the login information for you.

The real solution is LastPass – a free program that remembers all of your website login information for you.  Since it is web based, you can get your passwords from any computer with an internet connection.  And LastPass will even generate STRONG passwords for you – so you don’t have to keep using the same weak password on all of your accounts.  My general rule is this: if you can remember or pronounce your password, it’s too weak.  If it’s difficult for you to remember, it’s difficult for the hackers to guess it.  And LastPass will remember it for you anyway.

I wrote a full review of LastPass not long ago – you can read it here for more details.

“Can someone watch me through my webcam?”

The acronym “JRAT” stands for Java Remote Administration Tool.  It’s a type of software that is being used by a group of people who see this most commonly as a hobby.  It’s pretty creepy though, and could cause you a lot of headaches.

Here’s what happens:

1. This little piece of software gets onto your computer (how it gets there, we’ll talk about in a minute).

2. The person that put the program on your computer gets notified that you are his latest target (the common term for this is “slave”).

3. Your computer is now controlled by the person that RATted you.  What they will usually do is turn on your webcam to watch you.  But they do like to have fun and freak people out, so they might make your CD/DVD drive drawer open and close.  Or, they can use your computer’s Text-to-Speech function and have your speakers announce “I am watching you” or something similar.

The things they do just to get a reaction are bad enough.  Worse than that, some of the RAT programs have a built-in “keylogger” function.  That means that whatever you type on the keyboard, it is recorded to a text file and made available to the person controlling your computer.  Emails, Word documents, credit card numbers, whatever you type.

And that is just what happens when you are actually using your computer.  What about when your computer is on, but you are in the other room or not even at home?   This person can browse whatever is on your computer:

• pictures
• emails
• documents
• videos

Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to make that document called “Passwords.doc” and store it in your Documents folder, huh?

“How did the RAT get on my computer?”

Good question!  There are a few different ways, but I’ll describe a couple of the most common methods.  The people that create these RAT programs are constantly looking for new ways to get them embedded on as many computers as possible.  This process is known as “spreading” – and there are instructional e-books for sale that explain how to do it:

Method #1:  YouTube
This is probably the easiest method.  You just upload a video to YouTube, and in the description you put a link to the infected file (which is stored in a publicly-available Dropbox folder, or some other site with easy access).  Then you just sit back and wait for people to watch the video, and hope that some of them click on the link.  It helps if the video is wildly popular and gets hundreds or thousands of views.  You don’t have a viral video?  Just go find one on YouTube, download it to your computer, then upload it as if it were your own (many would call this stealing).  Even though you are just duplicating a video that is already on YouTube, you will get some of that search traffic.  Some YouTube videos get millions of views – so even if yours gets a small percentage, that’s a lot.  When someone clicks on the infected link, they are now your “slave”.

Method #2:  BitTorrent
BitTorrent websites are where people go to share files.  They are also known as “peer-to-peer (P2P)” file sharing sites.  Basically, you put all of your music files, or picture files, or program installation files, in a specific folder.  Then you go to the BitTorrent website and share the contents of that folder with anyone who wants grab one or more of your files.  For example, let’s say you have a music file called “AsLongAsYouLoveMe.mp3″ (this is one of Justin Bieber’s hit songs).  While you may not personally like this song, there are millions of kids that love it.  And lots of them go online to download it for free from a BitTorrent site.  And all those millions of users are sharing their own collection.  The key fact to remember here is that you can name a file anything you like.  So all you do is give your RAT file the name of a popular song, and go share it.  Or create hundreds of them, each one with a different name.  Anyone who downloads that file, thinking they are getting a popular song, is instead getting infected.

Here are some of the most popular BitTorrent sites:

• Torlock
• TorrentHound
• SeedPeer
• H33T
• BitSnoop
• Isohunt
• 1337X org
• TorrentDownloads
• VCDQ
• Vertor
• KAT.ph
• Torrent Funk
• TAKE FM
• Monova
• LimeTorrents
• FullDLS
• ThePirateBay
• TorrentCrazy
• Torrents to
• Thunderbytes
• Fenopy
• TorrentZap
• Nowtorrents
• ExtraTorrent
• Torrentz
• TorrentCafe
• BTScene
• Toorgle
• YourBitTorrent

(That list is certainly not complete – there are lots of them.)

“How can I make sure my computer doesn’t get a RAT infection?”

1. Don’t click on a link if you don’t know where it goes.  This applies to not only links in the description of YouTube videos, but also links in an email, in a Craigslist ad, wherever a clickable link can appear.

2. Avoid BitTorrent sites.  They are just bad news.  Ask your kids if they ever visit BitTorrent sites.  Look in their  Bookmarks or Favorites list and see if any are listed there.  If you find any, it is possible that computer is already infected.  Some parents don’t even want their kids’ pictures appearing on Facebook or other legitimate sites – how would you feel about some stranger watching your child through the webcam on the laptop?

3. Protect your computer(s).  One of the best defenses against a RAT infection is the paid version of Malwarebytes (click here to get it).  In most cases, this will prevent the file from getting into the computer.  If the computer is already infected, a full scan will most likely find it and get rid of it.

Here’s a report about webcam hacking recently released by Yahoo:

That is something that can easily happen when you are using Microsoft Word.

When you are in a Word document, you usually will see all of the editing tools displayed at the top, in what is called the “ribbon“.  You have options like Home, Insert, Page Layout, References and more – and each of those has multiple  tools to choose from.  The ribbon looks like this (you can click to see it full size):

What can easily happen is that you can accidentally hit a certain key combination, and suddenly your ribbon is just gone.  So you are left with a document that looks like this:

For a lot of users, this immediately inspires panic.  What happened?  How do I fix it?

Fortunately, the fix is pretty easy:  just hold down the CTRL key and tap the F1 key.  Like magic – your ribbon is back!

In fact, it was the CTRL + F1 key combination that you accidentally hit to make it disappear in the first place.  You might even use that intentionally in the future – if you don’t use the ribbon very often, you can just click to make it disappear and you then have extra screen space for your document.  CTRL + F1 will always toggle it on and off.

A few more keyboard shortcuts for Word:

Ctrl + P = print

Ctrl + W = closes the current document but keeps Word open

Ctrl + Z = undo the last action

Ctrl + F = search the document for a word or phrase

Ctrl + X = Cut

Ctrl + C = Copy

Ctrl + V = Paste

There are lots more of course – these are just a few that I use all the time.

Normally, if you want a WIRED connection in a different room, the procedure would be to run a wire to that room.  That usually means making a hole in the wall (maybe more than one).  Or running cable through the attic and dropping it down.  Or, dropping a cable through the floor and running it through the basement (here in Florida we don’t have the basement option).

Well, some smart person at some point in the not-too-distant past thought, “Hang on a second – I already have wires going to every room in my home.  The wiring that carries the electricity!  Why not use those wires to carry the internet as well?”  And it worked.

Now there are several companies that manufacture and sell these devices called powerline ethernet adapters.

In its simplest form, you have two of these units (like pictured above).  You plug one of them into an outlet near your router.  You connect an ethernet cable from the router to that adapter.  Then, you go to any other room in your house and plug in the other adapter.  That’s it!  Now you have an ethernet internet connection in that room.  You just connect your computer with a cable and you’re online.

I got a set of these recently because I needed an internet connection in the garage.  The wifi signal does reach that area, but I didn’t want to rely on that.  I just set up a pair of these powerline ethernet adapters and it works great.

Here’s a video that gives a good overview of how it works, and talks about the options for different models depending on what kind of speed you require:

One thing to remember: the powerline adapters must be inserted in an actual wall outlet.  You cannot put them in a surge protector or strip outlet.

I recently had a client who brought me a computer that had a few different issues.  They all seemed to be unrelated – odd error messages popping up, the screen not displaying content the way it should all the time, etc.  In cases like this, sometimes the issues really are unrelated (especially in older computers).  But sometimes, the problems all stem from one source – Windows Updates.  Or more accurately, the LACK of some Windows Updates.

In case you didn’t already know this, Microsoft issues updates to Windows each month.  They actually do this on the second Tuesday of the month, which has come to be known as “Patch Tuesday”.  Your computer is supposed to get those updates when they come in (assuming your computer is powered on and connected to the internet).

There are two types of updates: Important updates, and Optional updates.  The Important updates are the ones that are supposed to get installed automatically by default.  If you don’t change the schedule, this is set up to happen at 3 am.  If the computer isn’t on at 3 am, it should install the updates the next time you power it up.

The Optional updates, however, may or may not be getting downloaded and installed to your computer.  They are considered “optional” because they are not critical to the security of the computer – usually they consist of updates to the software for your video card, or information for your antivirus program, that kind of thing.

Don’t consider the “optional” updates as optional – I recommend getting them along with all the others that Microsoft classifies as Important.  That way you know you are getting and using the most recent software for your version of Windows as well as for all of the other peripheral items around your computer (audio, video, printer, scanner, external drive, etc.).

Here is how to configure Windows Updates to make sure you get everything you need:

Windows Updates for Windows 7:

1. Click the Start button (Microsoft logo in lower left corner) and then click on Control Panel.  In the top right, change the view to “Small Icons”.  Look for Windows Update in the list and click on it:

2. In the left-hand column, click on Change Settings:

3. In the settings Window, choose “Install updates automatically” and set the schedule you prefer.  Then, check all 4 boxes below that:

4. Click OK

Windows Updates for Windows 8:

1. On the Apps screen, click on the shortcut to go to Control Panel

2. In the top right, change the view to “Small Icons”.  Look for Windows Update in the list and click on it.

3. In the left-hand column, click on Change Settings.

4. In the settings Window, choose “Install updates automatically”.  Then, check the box that says “Give me recommended updates the same way I receive important updates”

5. Click OK

Windows Updates for Windows XP:

1. Click the Start button and go to Control Panel

2. On the left side, click “Classic View” (unless you are already in Classic View)

3. Open “Automatic Updates”

4. Choose “Automatic” and “Every day” as well as a time that you prefer to have the updates installed

5. Click OK

Windows Updates for Windows Vista:

(follow the instructions for Windows 7 – very similar, if not identical)

Even if you have the Windows Updates set to automatically download and install both Important and Optional updates, it can’t hurt to sometimes check and make sure you are getting all of them.  You can always click Start – All Programs – Windows Update and have the program check for any available updates, then get whatever comes up.

If you have been reading my blog or listening to my podcasts for any length of time, you know that I constantly stress the importance of having your data backed up offsite – away from your computer.  If you only have a backup on a local external drive, you are risking losing both your original AND your backup if you have a fire, flood, or theft.  Also, your backup process needs to be completely automated – if you have to remember to do it, it won’t get done consistently.

That’s where MyPC Backup comes in.  When it’s running on your computer, all of your important files are backed up safely offsite, every day, and you don’t even have to think about it.

Let’s talk about the pros and cons of this online backup service.

Cons:
When I first checked it out, I was a little put off by the somewhat “aggressive” sales techniques.  When you have your paid account first set up, there are multiple other upgrade options available for you to purchase.  For most people, these things aren’t really necessary – they include options such as hourly backup (instead of the standard once a day) and increased backup speed (mine happens overnight so I really don’t care how slow it works).  I just clicked “No thanks” on a couple of pages that listed these options.  They can always be added on later if needed.

I was also a little annoyed that the full pricing schedule was not published up front on their site.  This means you have to sign up for an account (free) in order to see the pricing.  Not sure I understand the reasoning behind this, since their pricing is very competitive with other online backup services, but that’s how they do it.

Pros:
One thing I like about this service is that you can set up your account right off the bat without any charges.  This initiates a small “sampling” backup so that you can see how it works, and you can visually observe that it will work successfully on your computer.  When talking to my clients about the importance of an online backup service, I sometimes find it helpful to get them to take “baby steps” in that direction.  Setting up an account without any obligation or payment is a good feature.

As far as the specific features, I like the fact that they offer the option of unlimited online backup for your computer’s hard drive.  Practically speaking, most people are fine with the basic “Home” package that gives 75gb of storage space – I find that many of my clients will probably never fill up that much space with their standard documents and photos.  But for those people that have hundreds of gigabytes of PDF files, high-res photos, or other files stored on their computer, it’s nice to know that you can have unlimited storage space if you need it (and it’s not even much more expensive).

I have also been pleasantly surprised when dealing with their customer service.  I haven’t actually had any real problems related to my online backup, but I have had a few occasions to contact them with some questions.  In every case, I have gotten a response in a relatively short period of time (within a couple of hours in most cases).  If you have an absolute emergency, you can pay an extra $10 and move to the front of the line for them to handle it immediately (fortunately I have not had a need to use that option).

Online backup pricing:
Many of the clients I deal with are home users.  For most people, the standard backup set includes Documents, Pictures, and anything stored on the desktop.  These are the items that MyPC Backup includes in the default backup if you don’t change anything.  You might need to backup other items as well, including music, videos, website Favorites, email, etc.

If your total file size to be backed up is less than 75gb, you will be fine with the basic “Home” package.  This gives you 75gb of storage space and will automatically back up your files and folders every day (you can set it to happen at the time you prefer – the computer just needs to be turned on).  If you want to just go month to month, this package is $6.95 per month.  You can definitely save a chunk of money by paying annually (and not have to bother with that bill each month).  If you pay annually, it comes out to $4.95 per month ($59.42 annually).  You can save a little more if you get 2 years up front.

NOTE: the above pricing reflects the current discount that is being offered by MyPC Backup.  I don’t know how long they plan to continue to offer that discounted price.  To get current pricing, you need to set up a free online backup account.

Using MyPC Backup:
Using this service is pretty easy.  They make the account setup and usage simple so that just about anyone can do it.  Here’s how to set it up:

(If possible, use Internet Explorer for the following process – that’s what I have seen to be the most successful,)

1. Go to the website (click here) to set up your account.  All you need to enter are your name, email, and the password you want to use.

2. As soon as you click the “Sign up” button to create your account, you will get the notification that the program is ready to download and install.  Click to give it permission to run.  You don’t have to watch out for any sneaky checkboxes or stuff like that.

3. When the program runs, the first thing you have to do is sign in with your email and the password you just created, and click Next:

4. After you have logged in, the program will offer you the choice of what to back up.  By default, it will back up Documents, Pictures, and Desktop.  For many users, that covers everything you need.  If you have files or folders stored in other places (such as an older version of Outlook for your email, or perhaps your iTunes music collection), you need to click on the “Custom” backup selection and tell it what you want to back up specifically.  If you have trouble with this, I can help you with it – just contact me.

5. At this point, the program begins running and it is actually doing your first “sample” backup.  However – THIS IS NOT A COMPLETE BACKUP.  If you stop at this point, most of your files will not be backed up.

6. On the web page, look for the “Upgrade” button and click it:

7. On the next screen, choose which package you want (75gb, 250gb, or Unlimited).  You can also decide if you want to pay monthly, every 6 months, yearly, or every two years.  I do it annually just so I don’t have to bother with another monthly bill, but you should do whatever is best for your situation.

8. Fill in your contact and credit card information, and you’re done.  As I mentioned earlier, there are a few screens that will display other optional upgrades – you can decide if you need those things or not.

From this point, you don’t have to worry about losing your important files.  You will get a little window from MyPC Backup that pops up each day to advise you that all of your files have been backed up safely.  I can tell you from personal experience, it’s nice to not have to remember to do this!

A couple of items to note:

- After you have upgraded and the first “real” (meaning complete) backup starts, it will probably take a while.  In fact, it may take several days or even a week or more.  That’s because this first time it has to back up ALL of your stuff.  After it gets the first backup done, subsequent backups only have to grab new files or files that you have changed – so they don’t take much time at all.  This is true of any automatic online backup service.

- If you should ever need to access the files that are backed up online, all you have to do is log into your account and click on whatever file you need.  You can do this from any computer that has an internet connection.

MyPC Backup – automated online backup service

If you just started using Windows 8, what’s the one thing that you miss the most?  The Start button, of course.  It’s been a familiar component of Windows ever since Windows 95!  And now with Windows 8, the Start button is gone – along with the Start menu that everyone is used to using.

Time to get the Start Button back!

To make Windows 8 look like Windows 7, we’re going to use a simple, free program called Classic Shell.  You can get it at ClassicShell.net.

What Classic Shell does is simple: it brings back the Windows 7 or Windows XP Start button so that you can use it to access your programs, files and folders like you could before Windows 8 eliminated that feature.

I will go through the installation process below.  Pay close attention during the download process – you may end up with an unintentional download if you get distracted and click on the wrong thing.

How to install Classic Shell:

1. Go to the website www.ClassicShell.net.  If you are on the correct site, you will see this logo:

2. You can read the site and see the various features described.  When you are ready to proceed, look for the “Download Now” button over on the left side.  The software is free, but there is also a “Donate” button if you would like to contribute to the creators of the program:

3. When you click the “Download Now” button, you will be taken to a different website to get the actual download.  Here is where you need to be careful and pay attention to what you are downloading.  On this other site, there are ads for other programs, and the ads include a big “Download” button – it’s designed to trick you into clicking it.  Don’t click another download button on this page.  This is what it looks like:

I really hate that sites like this, with legitimate software, allow ads that are deliberately deceitful.  But that’s another story.

4. Rather than click a Download button, your download should start up automatically.  In Chrome, you will see it happening in the lower left corner.  In Firefox,you’ll get a window asking if you want to Run or Save the file (click Run).  In Internet Explorer, there will be a dialogue window at the bottom edget of the screen asking to either Run or Save (click Run).

5. Running the program will take you through the installation process, which is pretty basic.  I didn’t see anything tricky or sneaky, which is nice.  Here is what you should see:

6. When you click that “Finish” button, you might see the “Readme” file which gives some more information, but it’s not absolutely necessary that you read it (uncheck the “View Readme file” to avoid seeing it).  Otherwise, you’re almost done.

You will see the Start button down there in the lower left corner.  It “sort of” looks like the old Microsoft logo that used to show up there – same colors anyway, and it’s overall circular in shape.

The first time you click on it, the “settings” window come up on the screen.  In that window, you have the choice of Basic Settings or All Settings.  Here are what those two windows look like:

If you are curious about all those other settings, you can go exploring in the “All settings” menu and see what options  you have (there are lots of choices).  However, all you really have to do is choose one of the 3 Start Menu options that are displayed on both of the Settings screens.  Just click on either Windows Classic, Windows XP, or Windows 7, and click OK.

You’ll see this little warning:

Just click Yes, and you’re done – your computer is ready to be used very similarly to the way your previous version of Windows functioned.

You’ll notice that there are still some differences.  When you click the Start button, it used to give you the option to click on “All Programs” so you could choose one.  That option is still there:

But in addition to that is the option to choose from the Apps that are installed:

I’m not going to go into Apps here – that’s a topic for another blog post.  Just know that you can now access all of your Apps right from this menu.

Couple other points:

- If you ever do want to actually vew the “Metro” screen that shows icons for all the apps, you can do that by moving your cursor up to the top left corner of the screen so that a little menu appears, then move the cursor down to the lower left corner of the screen where you see the little thumbnail image of the Metro screen.  Click on that image.

- If you decide that you just want to go back to the way Windows 8 was originally, without the Start button and Start menu, you can do that too.  Click Start – Control Panel  – Programs and Features.  Find Classic Shell in the list, and click to Uninstall it.  But why would you want to do that??

If you try Classic Shell, let me know what you think about it in the comments section.  Good, bad or in between, I would like to hear your thoughts on it.

The site/service is called MightyText.  You can get it at www.MightyText.net.

When I first saw this, I thought, “Yeah, whatever – I have seen lots of sites like this.”  Which is true.  There are lots of sites that say they will make it possible for you to “send text messages from your computer”.  In my experience, they usually don’t work as advertised.

First, when you go to fill out the form with the recipient’s phone number, you also have to choose the recipient’s cell provider in order for the message to go through.  How am I supposed to know that?  I know I use T-Mobile but I sure don’t know which service all of my friends and colleagues use.

Then, if you do get to the point where you can submit your message, it comes back with “message cannot be sent” for whatever reason.  And this is supposed to be easier than sending a text message from your phone?  I haven’t tried one of those sites in a while, so maybe they work better now.  I think some of them were created back when fewer people used text messaging.

Anyway, I was pleased to find that MightyText offered something very different.

It’s not just a website where you fill out a form to send a text message to a phone number.  This is a service that actually WORKS WITH your Android phone to sync all of your text messages.  Sorry, Mac people – not currently available for iPhones.

To give you an idea of what the user interface looks like, here is what I see on my computer screen after it’s set up (click the image to see it full size):

As you can see, the right side of the screen is the text of my current text message conversation.  On the left side is a list of my most recent ones.  This thing really replicates my phone, which is very handy.

Some of you might be asking, “Why would you need this?  Why can’t you just send text messages from your phone?”  Valid question.  And in reality, I do a lot of text messaging from my phone because it is very handy.  When this little app comes in handy is when I am sitting at home working on my computer, and someone sends me a text message.  I reply via my phone, and a conversation starts.  So I might be working on my computer, but every time it’s my turn to reply I have to stop using my regular keyboard, pick up my phone, read the message on that smaller screen, then reply using that smaller keyboard.  Then I put the phone down and go back to the computer.

I don’t have to do that any more!  Now, sending and receiving text messages is as easy as switching to a different window and typing a reply.  This is MUCH more convenient, and saves me some valuable time.  I love time savers!

And another benefit – what if you left your phone in the car, or you are at work and you forgot and left your phone at home?  If you have MightyText installed on your computer, it will still sync your text messages so you won’t miss any messages that get sent, and you can still reply right away even if you don’t have your phone with you.

Setting this up is fairly easy:

Step 1: Use your phone to get the MightyText Android app from the Google Play Store.

Step 2: Set up MightyText on  your computer or tablet.  It will work with Google Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, or Safari.  For tablets, you can use it on any Android tablet, iPad, or the Kindle Fire.  Full instructions for computer/tablet setup are on the MightyText website.  Not complicated.

Here are a few things recent users have said about MightyText via Twitter:

It’s free, so give it a try.  I think you will like it.

What is Java?  Simply put, Java is a computer programming language.  One of its advantages is that it can be used to create applications that are “cross-platform” – that just means that the programmer can create the application once, and know that it will work on a PC computer or a Mac computer, or even Linux.

Java can be used in a couple of ways:

1. In an application, such as a game.  There is a popular game called Minecraft that requires you to install Java on your computer in order to play the game.

2. As a plug-in for your web browser.  For example, if you use GoToWebinar to attend an online webinar presentation, it requires that you have Java enabled on your browser as an add-on.  If your browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, etc) does not have Java enabled, you won’t be able to see the webinar content.

What is the security problem with Java?
Recently, there have been several security issues discovered with Java.  Two things to note about that: First, these are major security flaws.  Like the kind that will allow malicious software to infect your computer just by you visiting an infected website.  Second, Oracle (the company that created Java) is very slow to patch up these security problems.  So the bad guys have more time to exploit the issue and infect more computers.

How do you avoid or eliminate having a Java-related problem?
The safest solution is to just not have it installed on your computer (I’ll tell you in a minute how to get rid of it).  In other words, if you don’t use any websites that require Java, and you don’t use any actual programs that require it, take it off your computer and don’t worry about it any more.

That brings us to this question – what about the people that DO require Java in their web browser?  For example, online webinars as mentioned earlier.  There are also many banks in Europe that use Java as part of their online banking programming.  I also have a client that regularly plays games online at Pogo.com, which is one of the few websites that still use Java to present their content.

If you are one of those users that does still need to use a web browser that has Java enabled, simply choose to have it enabled on just one browser – and only use that browser for that purpose.

For example – if Firefox is your default web browser, disable Java so that it won’t work with Firefox.  But for that one website that you need to use, that requires Java, use a different browser such as Google Chrome.  Have Java enabled on Chrome, and ONLY use Chrome for that one website, that single purpose.  Or vice-versa – use Chrome for everything, and only have Java installed on Firefox for that one site.

How to disable Java in your web browser
It’s fairly easy actually.  You need to do this for each web browser you have installed on your computer (unless you are going to keep it on just one of them, as mentioned in the example above).

To disable Java in Internet Explorer:
Click Tools – Manage Add-ons – look in the “Toolbars and Extensions” category and disable anything Java

To disable Java in Firefox:
Click Tools – Add-ons – look in the Plugins category and disable anything Java

To disable Java in Google Chrome:
In the address bar, type:  about:plugins and hit Enter on the keyboard – look for Java in the list, and click on the “Disable” link

Practically speaking, you should be fine just by disabling Java in your browser(s).  However, if you want to be sure it’s gone, go to Control Panel, find it in the list of programs, and uninstall it from there.  You may need to restart the computer after that.

A couple other things to note:

- Java and Javascript are two different things.  Java is the problem child.  Javascript can stay.

- Oracle, the company that created and maintains the security for Java, is developing a rather unsavory reputation.  First of all, because they are not showing all that much concern for fixing the serious security issues with Java.  Patches come out when they come out, and that’s the way it is.  But the other thing is that when they do come out with the security updates, the installation comes with other crappy stuff piggybacking on them.  Junk like the Ask toolbar, or some security scanner for your browser.  You have to UNcheck a box to opt out of these things or they get installed automatically.  As you probably know, they make money every time someone inadvertently doesn’t pay attention and one of those annoying things gets installed.  There is no excuse for sneaking in that kind of stuff with these updates.

And what is even worse – they have the crapware installation set for a 10-minute delay.  So if you see the notice at the end that says “Java is updated, and the Ask toolbar has been installed”, then go to Control Panel to immediately UNinstall it, it won’t be there.  So you go on about your business assuming it did NOT get installed, but then it really does sneak in 10 minutes later.  It seems like Oracle is trying very hard to be a company that everyone hates, and deliberately deceitful practices such as this will certainly achieve that for them.

If you need help with Java, get in touch with me and I can get it configured properly through my Remote Support service.

With the password situation, we have conflicting ideals:  Everyone wants to be completely secure, but everyone also wants what is most convenient.

Out of the desire for convenience, many people just use the same password (or the same 2 or 3 passwords) for all of their online sites.  And even those are simple passwords, ones that are easily cracked.  But it sure is convenient!

On the other hand, if you want security, you have to use a password that is not pronounceable, and consists of upper and lower case letters, some numbers, and maybe even a character or symbol or two.  And the longer the better – at least 8-10 digits, preferably more.  Of course you won’t be able to remember it, but it sure is secure!

Not long ago I wrote about the password management program called LastPass – it will remember  your passwords for you so you can use secure ones without having to commit them to memory.

The big question – how secure are your passwords?

Would you like to know how secure the passwords are that you are currently using for various sites?  With the help of an online password checker, you can.

There are actual several sites that check this, but the one I like is actually run by Microsoft.  You can find it here.

Using it is easy – just type in one of the passwords that you use, and see how it rates it.  For this example, I entered the password:  forecast89

As you can see, it rated it as “Weak”.  That’s because it uses a common dictionary word, no upper case letters, and there are no special characters.

Now, I’ll try a different one.  This one was actually generated by the LastPass password generator tool:  M4nf7@YCB8ya

Look at that – even a crazy one like that doesn’t earn the highest rating.  Still, “Strong” is pretty good and would be a vast improvement over most of the ones in use today.  To get the highest strength rating, you could just make one like this but make it longer.

So, next time you are thinking about what to use for a password – don’t use one you have used before, and make sure it’s a strong one.  There could come a day when it gets tested!

But I’m actually going to show you something even better – you can clean out your Gmail inbox, without having to delete any of those emails!

Believe me, I understand how quickly a Gmail account can get overwhelmed by email.  I have one computer that I work on fairly regularly that has over 60,000 emails stored.  Yours probably isn’t quite that “stuffed” but it doesn’t take long before your Gmail inbox can be too full to easily handle.

You need a fresh start – and here’s how to do it.

To demonstrate this, I will use one of my Gmail accounts that I don’t look at very often.  As you can see, this account currently has 3,575 emails in the inbox.  And Gmail only displays the most recent 50 emails:

The first thing you want to do is look in the top left area of the window for a single lone checkbox.  It is not outwardly labeled, but it’s pretty powerful as we will see:

When you check that box, you will see that it automatically also checks the box in front of each of those 50 emails that are currently listed.  But that’s not the exciting thing.  At this point, you will see a simple, one-line link that is now added to give you another option:

This is big!  You have the option of just selecting the 50 that are displayed, or you can place a checkmark in front of all 3575 emails that are currently in the inbox.   This means that whatever you want to do with these emails, you can do all at one time – instead of having to handle 70 individual groups of 50 emails.

So you click that link and now all 3,575 are selected.  What do you want to do with them?  Remember, whatever you choose to do, it’s going to happen to all of them at the same time.  You basically have two choices:

1. You can delete them.  This means that they will eventually be gone from your Gmail account, never to be seen again.  This is a little scary – can you say with 100% certainty that you will never again need to see any one of those 3,575 emails?  If you can, then go ahead and delete them by clicking on the “trash can” icon:

2. You can archive them.  I like this option much better.  When you archive all of them, it serves two purposes:  First, it cleans them out of your inbox – and for some people, the feeling of having an empty email inbox is something they haven’t experienced in a long time.  It’s great!  Second, it stores them safely elsewhere in your Gmail account, so that you can access them at any time in the future if you need to.  You can do this by clicking on the “Archive” icon:

You will get a warning message: “This action will affect all 3575 conversations in the Inbox.  Are you sure you want to continue?”  Click OK.

Now take a look at your inbox:

Congratulations – you have an empty inbox!  Enjoy this moment, because it probably won’t be that way for very long!

At this point, you might be wondering – if you didn’t delete those emails, and they are no longer in your inbox, where did they go?  In other words, how do you find them if you need to read one of them in the future?

Here’s how to see where they all are.  Look over on the left side of the screen and you will see a list of labels:  Inbox, Starred, Important, Sent Mail, etc.  One of those will be called “All Mail”.  If you don’t see it listed, click on “More” and you will see it:

When you click the “All Mail” you will see every email you have archived.  They will all stay right there, safe and sound forever, unless you delete them.

Now the fun part – what if you need to find a specific email?  For example, you know you got an email from a particular person sometime in the past year, but you don’t recall exactly when.  It would take forever to scroll through all those emails to try to find it.  There’s a super-easy solution.

Look at the top of your Gmail account window.  You will see a search bar:

I have found that a lot of people think this is just another way to search the internet with Google.  It’s not.  That is where you can search your Gmail email account.

For example, if you wanted to find all the email from a particular person, just type in that person’s email address.  Or his or her name.  If you want to find all emails that have a certain word in the message, search for that word.  The search results come up very quickly (Google’s specialty is search, after all).

This means you really don’t have to worry about filing your emails in a particular manner.  You can just throw them all into the “All Mail” area like you just did, and through the search process you should always be able to find the one(s) you’re looking for.

It’s the best of both worlds – you have an empty inbox, but still have quick, easy access to all of the information in all of those emails.

It might not seem to make sense to pay for something, and then not use it.  But there are several reasons why it is to your advantage to NOT use the email account that your internet provider gives you:

1. It’s temporary.  Yes, I know you don’t have any plans to change your internet provider.  But trust me, it will happen.  There could be some new technology that comes up and you decide to switch to it (that was my last ISP change – we went from cable internet to FIOS).  Or you might move, and your current provider doesn’t service your new area.  Or, your ISP might get bought out by a bigger company and change everyone’s email address (that actually happened a few years ago in Maine).  Whatever the reason, when your internet provider changes, you will no longer have the email account so you will have to change email addresses.  The really silly thing would be to change to an email that’s provided by the NEW internet company, because that one is ALSO temporary.

2. You get limited server space.  The amount of space you get on the internet provider’s email server will vary from one provider to another.  But as an example, here in the Tampa Bay area if you are a Road Runner customer (BrightHouse), the standard email account gets 100 mb of space for emails.  That is very little space.  That means you need to either check your email regularly and delete most of them, or you need to use an email program such as Outlook and download them regularly to your computer.  If you get a fair amount of email and don’t check it for a few days, you reach your 100 mb limit and any further email that gets sent to you just bounces back to the sender.  You can get more space, but of course that means buying a more expensive package.

3. Spam filters are probably weak.  Internet service providers are not known for their stellar spam-blocking capability.  So you will either end up with a bunch of junk email in your inbox regularly, or you will have to be very selective about where you give out your email address.  You might even use a second email account for “junk” in order to keep it out of your “real” account.  But in reality, it’s just a matter of time before your primary email address gets invaded by the spammers too.

There are other reasons, but these are the 3 big ones.

So if you don’t use the email account that you get with your internet connection, what should you use?  What I recommend is a web-based email account.  I use Gmail so I can vouch for that service personally – it’s practically perfect as far as functionality.  Of course, there are other web-based email services such as MSN, Hotmail, and Yahoo.  And Microsoft recently introduced Outlook.com, which is being talked about as the first real competitor to Google’s Gmail service.

If you own a business or have your own website with your own domain name, that is another good option because you own it.  For example, since I own the domain “ComputerTutorFlorida.com”, I could have the email address “Scott@computertutorflorida.com” or really ANYTHING@computertutorflorida.com.  I don’t use that email because the domain name is a little long for people to type out.  Back when Gmail was first introduced in 2004, I was able to get the email address “pctutor@gmail.com” and that has been my primary email account ever since.

How does Gmail handle the 3 points listed above that are problems with the ISP email account?

1. It’s NOT temporary.  When you sign up for a Gmail account, it is yours for life.  It does not matter what company supplies your internet connection, and it doesn’t matter where you live.  So you can switch to Gmail one time, and you don’t have to worry about sometime in the future having to change your email address.

2. You get LOTS of server space – probably more than you will ever use.  Every time you are in your Gmail account, you will see a little bar at the bottom of the screen that shows how much of your available space you have used.  I have had my primary Gmail account for about 9 years, and I get a TON of email.  And if it’s an email that I think I might need to refer to in the future, I don’t delete it from Gmail’s server.  And still, after all that time and all those emails, I am currently using 35% of my available space (using 3.6 gb out of 10.1 gb available).  I have been at 35% for years, so I’m not worried about running out of space for my emails.

3. Spam filters are excellent.  There have been times in the past where I have used “throwaway” email accounts in order to divert the spam away from my primary account.  But over the years I have learned that with Gmail I don’t need to do that.  Gmail has such intelligent spam filters, I use my primary account for everything.  In fact, a lot of internet marketers will tell you, “never put your main email address on your website, because it will be harvested by spammers and you’ll be inundated with junk emails”.  But I don’t even worry about that because Gmail filters that garbage out and I hardly ever see spam in my Inbox.  I do still check my spam folder sometimes, just in case something ends up there that shouldn’t.  That happens sometimes, but not often.

One other point to consider.  Usually, when I suggest switching from the ISP email account to Gmail, the first excuse I hear is, “Yeah, but I’ve had that email address for so long – everyone I know has it!”.  Trust me – that doesn’t matter.  First of all, as I mentioned in #1 above, you are going to have to switch eventually anyway.  But more importantly, Gmail has this great feature that allows you to get all of the email that comes into your OLD email address to automatically come into  your new Gmail account.  So you will never miss any emails, even if people still email you at your old account.

If you need help in making the switch to a new email account, give me a call – I can help.

(Thanks to Door from Podnutz.com for calling in with the question for this week’s blog/podcast.  If you would like to call in your own question or comment, call my Podcast Voice Mail line at 727-386-9468 – it’s available 24/7 and never answered by a human.)

If you’re not familiar with Hulu, you should go and check out their website.  It’s basically a way for you to watch TV shows and movies (clips as well as whole episodes) on your computer.   The majority of content is from the US, and a lot of people outside the US really want to see it.  But Hulu has copyright agreements with several of the US production companies (such as Disney) that means they are not allowed to let non-US viewers see their content.

That means that when you go to the Hulu website, the first thing it will check is your IP address (this is like your “address” on the internet).  If you have an American IP address, you’re fine.  If your IP address indicates you are in Europe, Asia, or even Canada, you can’t get into the site.

Unless you know the secret to getting past that little barrier:  all you have to do is get an American IP address.  With that in place, your computer basically tells any website that you visit, “Hey, I’m in the USA!” and you get all the privileges that go with that.

Note: while on the surface this procedure may seem a little sketchy, you really have nothing to worry about.  There are no laws, either in the US or abroad, that prohibit you from watching Hulu (although I encourage you to check your own laws if you happen to be in a country with severe governmental restrictions, such as communist China).  The only restrictions in this situation are that Hulu can’t make the content available to non-US IP addresses.  The French police aren’t going to arrest you for watching The Simpsons on your laptop in Paris.

Here’s how you do it (this is based on Windows 7):

1. Press the Windows key + R to open the “run” box.
2. Type: ncpa.cpl into the run box and hit enter or click OK
3. On the icon for your current network adapter, RIGHT click and choose Properties.
4. In the list, click once to highlight Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4), then click on Properties.
5. Change your DNS settings to the following:
Preferred DNS server: 149.154.158.186
Alternate DNS server: 199.167.30.144
6. Click OK to close that window, then go to Hulu and see if you are able to view anything.

I have tried this with friends in both Europe and South America, and it worked successfully with both of them.  I would like to have someone try it from China, since their government is so restrictive about web content anyway.  However, keep in mind that these blocks are not in place because of any government or law – it’s just an agreement that Hulu has entered into with some of their content providers.

Important note: if you do use this workaround to view Hulu outside the US, make sure that when you are done watching your show(s) that you set your DNS numbers back to what they were before (or blank, if they were blank).  Otherwise, your internet connection will run more slowly when you visit the other websites that you usually view.

See you in 2013!

First of all, which cables are your ethernet cables?

Your internet signal comes in on a cable that emerges from your wall.  It goes from there to the modem.  That cable is not your ethernet cable.

Then there is an ethernet cable that comes out of the modem and goes to one of these places: either directly to your computer (if you only have one computer online), or to a router.  From the router, you could have ethernet cables that go to one or more computers (or none, if your connections are all wireless).  In some cases, the modem and the router are actually one unit.

You can also identify an ethernet cable by looking at the plug on the end – it looks similar to a phone jack plug, just a little wider.  You can’t really identify them by color – they come in a variety of colors.

Once you have identified your ethernet cable(s), get out your reading glasses and look at the writing on the cable itself.  You will find that your cable is most likely one of these three types:

1. Cat5 cable – this is the oldest type of ethernet cable.  If you have had your computer equipment for several years, and have used the same modem and/or router for all that time, you may very well have Cat5 cable.  If you do, your internet connection is slower than it has to be.  Cat5 cable is outdated.

2. Cat5 E cable – the “E” stands for “enhanced”.  In fact, you might see it labeled at “Enhanced Cat5″.  If you had a brand new internet connection installed in your home today, this is probably what would be used.  It is able to handle higher speeds that today’s modems and routers offer.

3. Cat6 cable – this is the fastest cable, and is usually the most expensive (although it is really not much more expensive than Cat5 Enhanced).  It supports the fastest speeds, but it’s kind of overkill for a standard home internet connection.  It couldn’t hurt to use this cable, but for most residential setups, Cat5 E will work fine.

If you discover that your cable is the old Cat5, it’s a simple and inexpensive procedure to just buy a length of Cat5 Enhanced cable and replace it.  On Amazon you can get a 25 foot section for less than $10 including shipping (in the US anyway).  If your various units are all nearby each other, you might get by with a 6-foot or 10-foot length.

It’s definitely worth the swap to get the extra speed without paying for the higher speed package from your internet provider!

Here’s the problem: when you order something online, it is most commonly sent by one of three carriers: UPS, Federal Express, or the US Mail.  For UPS and Fedex, there is always a tracking number.  The US Mail also has a tracking number if it is specifically sent that way.

So, when the vendor ships out your item, it usually means that you get an email with a notification that the item has been sent.  I do the same thing when I sell a laptop to someone and ship it out – it’s nice to be able to track where your item is, and know what day it is supposed to arrive.

The difficulty lies in the fact that those emails are all laid out differently, with a mix of fonts and formats, and you have to go and hunt down the tracking number that’s buried somewhere in the text of the email message.

Then, once you know the tracking number, you need to go to the carrier’s website (UPS, Fedex or USPS) and enter the tracking number in order to get information on the shipment.

That’s a time-consuming hassle even if you’re only expecting one delivery.  What if you order stuff all the time, or you have 8 – 10 items ordered at the same time?  You could spend half the day just trying to figure out when your stuff will arrive.

Fortunately, a while back I discovered a better way.  It’s called Tracky.  Like a lot of the great tools on the internet, it’s free.  It also does not require you to install anything on your computer.

First step: enter your email address in the form on the front page (Trackyapp.com).  That’s it!

Using it is incredibly easy.  Whenever you get an email notifying you that a product has been shipped, you just forward that email to track@trackyapp.com.  From that point on, you don’t have to do anything.

You will get an email confirming that Tracky is following the progress of your package.  Then you will get an email saying “Your package from _____ is arriving today!”  That way, you can know to expect it and even make sure you or someone else is there if a signature is required.

You can also go to the Tracky site and see about the estimated arrival date of everything they are tracking for you.  At the moment, I am not expecting anything, but I can still see the most recent ones that I was following:

There are also Tracky apps available for your smartphone (Android, iPhone, or Windows phone).  Personally I don’t use the mobile app – all of the notifications come to me by email, and I get that on my phone anyway.

Time to panic?  Not just yet.

Some of my clients immediately call me when this happens.  I give them the steps they need to take to get their internet back up and running.

Some people will call their internet provider to find out how to get the internet back.  However, what they tell you as the first thing to try is the same thing I would tell you as the first thing to try (which commonly fixes the problem).

What you need to do is power cycle your modem and router.

While that may sound complicated, I guarantee you it is an easy thing to do.  First, you need to identify which box is the modem, and which is the router.

- If you only have one computer and it does not connect wirelessly, you may have only a modem and no router.  If that’s your situation, you only need to power cycle the modem.

- In some cases, the modem and the router are combined in a single unit (this is what we have here with Verizon FIOS).  If that’s the case, you only need to do this procedure with that one unit.

In the picture above, the box on the left is a modem and the box on the right is a router.  Your modem and router may not look exactly like this – these are just examples.  One thing that is pretty universale is that the router will have several ports on the back as the one in the picture does (it may or may not have a visible antenna like this one though).  Common router brands are Linksys, Netgear and Belkin.

Here are the basics of what these things do:  Your internet provider has a cable coming into your home, and that cable connects to their modem.  Then, if you have just one computer, you can connect your computer to that modem in order to get the internet signal.  If you have more than one computer, then you connect a router to the modem (by a cable).  Then the other computer connect to the modem – either by a cable plugged into one of those ports, or by picking up the wireless signal that the router sends out.

When your internet signal is lost, here are the steps to follow:

1. Turn off the computer.

2. Unplug the power cord from the back of the router.

3. Unplug the power cord from the back of the modem.  (Again, if your modem and router is a single unit, you would combine steps 2 and 3 as one procedure.)

NOTE: the power cord plugs for the modem and the router can sometimes look very similar – make sure you keep track which is which while you are doing this.

4. Wait 30 seconds.

5. Plug the power cord back into the modem.  Wait 60 seconds.

6. Plug the power cord back into the router.  Wait 60 seconds.

7. Turn the computer back on, and it’s quite likely that you will see that your internet signal has returned.  You fixed it!

If this procedure did not bring back the internet, it’s probably time to call your internet provider and have them do some diagnostic checks from their end to see if the problem might be a failing or defective modem, or if a line outside has become damaged.  But at least at this point you can tell them that you already power cycled the equipment, so that is one fewer test they will need to do (they might want you to do it again anyway, just to document it for the call).

Here’s the basic idea behind the Fiverr.com website:

There are a lot of people in this world
that will do just about anything for $5,
and now there’s a place where you can hire them.

I’ll tell you about Fiverr here, and even give you some examples of the things you will find there, but the real way to experience it is to go there, register for a free account, and hire someone to do something for you for $5.

The “gigs” at Fiverr are divided into categories and subcategories:

Gifts – greeting cards, video greetings, unusual gifts, arts and crafts, handmade jewelry, gifts for geeks, postcards from…, recycled crafts

Graphics and Design – cartoons and caricatures, logo design, illustration, ebook covers and packages, web design, photography and photoshopping, presentation design, flyers and brochures, business cards, banners and headers, architecture, landing pages

Video and Animation – video and animation, editing and post production, animation and 3D, reviews by actors, puppets, stop motion, intros

Online Marketing – web analytics, article and PR submission, blog mentions, domain research, fan pages, keywords research, SEO, bookmarking and links, social marketing, get traffic, video marketing

Writing and Translation – copywriting, SEO, creating writing and scripting, translation, transcripts, website content, reviews, resumes and cover letters, speech writing, proofreading and editing, press releases

Advertising – hold your sign, flyers and handouts, human billboards, pet models, outdoor advertising, radio, music promotion, banner advertising

Business – business plans, career advice, market research, presentations, virtual assistant, business tips, branding services, financial consulting, legal consulting

Programming and Tech – .Net, C++, CSS and HTML, Joomla and Drupal, Databases, Java, Javascript, PSD to HTML, WordPress, iOS, Android and Mobile, PHP, QA and Software testing, Technology

Music and Audio – Audio editing and mastering, Jingles, songwriting, music lessons, rap music, hip-hop music, narration and voice-over, sound effects and loops, custom ringtones, voicemail greetings, custom songs

Fun and Bizarre – Your message on…, extremely bizarre, celebrity impersonators, daredevils and stunts, pranks, dancers, just for fun

Lifestyle – animal care and pets, relationship advice, diet and weight loss, health and fitness, makeup, styling and beauty, online private lessons, astrology and fortune telling, spiritual and healing, cooking recipes, parenting tips, travel

Other – whatever doesn’t fit into another category

I’m guessing you can probably just look through those subcategories and see some ideas for ways you might use this service.  It’s certainly a great place to get someone a personalized Christmas or birthday gift.

Here are a few that I found interesting (believe me, there are a LOT more):

And here are a few of the more… UNUSUAL… ones I came across:

You really have to explore the site to appreciate everything that is offered.  Some of the gigs are really useful, and it’s pretty amazing to be able to get this stuff done for only $5.  Others are really weird.  Check out the video below.  This guy is advertising his own Fiverr service, where he will come on camera and create a video saying whatever you want him to say.  Doesn’t get much creepier than this:

A few things to keep in mind:

1. As you go through the various listings, when you find the ones you might want to come back to, click on the “Collect” link.  This keeps track of those so you are able to get back to them (you need a free account to be able to do that).

2. Before buying, check the seller’s rating and feedback.  Don’t buy from someone with a lot of dissatisfied customers.

3. The basic gigs are all $5, but there are usually some add-ons that you can purchase for extra money (such as getting the job done more quickly than normal).

4. You could be a Fiverr seller – if you find yourself looking at these various things and saying, “Wow, I could do that!” then it might be something you should look into.  The sellers actually get $4 for performing the service (Fiverr keeps $1 as their cut).  But if you can perform a task quickly multiple times a day, it might be a way to make some extra money from home.

Have you used Fiverr?  What did you use it for, and what did you think of it?

]]> http://computertutorflorida.com/2012/12/how-to-get-almost-anything-done-for-5/feed/ 2 Today's tip is one you have either heard of and already used and know how great it is, or you have never heard of it before and you are about to discover a whole new world of possibility. - Here's the basic idea behind the Fiverr.com website: Today's tip is one you have either heard of and already used and know how great it is, or you have never heard of it before and you are about to discover a whole new world of possibility. Here's the basic idea behind the Fiverr.com website: There are a lot of people in this world that will do just about anything for $5, and now there's a place where you can hire them. I'll tell you about Fiverr here, and even give you some examples of the things you will find there, but the real way to experience it is to go there, register for a free account, and hire someone to do something for you for $5. The "gigs" at Fiverr are divided into categories and subcategories: Gifts - greeting cards, video greetings, unusual gifts, arts and crafts, handmade jewelry, gifts for geeks, postcards from..., recycled crafts Graphics and Design - cartoons and caricatures, logo design, illustration, ebook covers and packages, web design, photography and photoshopping, presentation design, flyers and brochures, business cards, banners and headers, architecture, landing pages Video and Animation - video and animation, editing and post production, animation and 3D, reviews by actors, puppets, stop motion, intros Online Marketing - web analytics, article and PR submission, blog mentions, domain research, fan pages, keywords research, SEO, bookmarking and links, social marketing, get traffic, video marketing Writing and Translation - copywriting, SEO, creating writing and scripting, translation, transcripts, website content, reviews, resumes and cover letters, speech writing, proofreading and editing, press releases Advertising - hold your sign, flyers and handouts, human billboards, pet models, outdoor advertising, radio, music promotion, banner advertising Business - business plans, career advice, market research, presentations, virtual assistant, business tips, branding services, financial consulting, legal consulting Programming and Tech - .Net, C++, CSS and HTML, Joomla and Drupal, Databases, Java, Javascript, PSD to HTML, Wordpress, iOS, Android and Mobile, PHP, QA and Software testing, Technology Music and Audio - Audio editing and mastering, Jingles, songwriting, music lessons, rap music, hip-hop music, narration and voice-over, sound effects and loops, custom ringtones, voicemail greetings, custom songs Fun and Bizarre - Your message on..., extremely bizarre, celebrity impersonators, daredevils and stunts, pranks, dancers, just for fun Lifestyle - animal care and pets, relationship advice, diet and weight loss, health and fitness, makeup, styling and beauty, online private lessons, astrology and fortune telling, spiritual and healing, cooking recipes, parenting tips, travel Other - whatever doesn't fit into another category I'm guessing you can probably just look through those subcategories and see some ideas for ways you might use this service.  It's certainly a great place to get someone a personalized Christmas or birthday gift. Here are a few that I found interesting (believe me, there are a LOT more): And here are a few of the more... UNUSUAL... ones I came across: You really have to explore the site to appreciate everything that is offered.  Some of the gigs are really useful, and it's pretty amazing to be able to get this stuff done for only $5.  Others are really weird.  Check out the video below.  This guy is advertising his own Fiverr service, where he will come on camera and create a video saying whatever you want him to say.  Doesn't get much creepier than this: A few things to keep in mind: 1. As you go through the various listings, when you find the ones you might want to come back to, click on the "Collect" link.  This keeps track of those so you are able to get back to them (you need a free account to be able to do that). 2. Before buying, check the seller's rating and feedback.  Don't buy from someone with a lot of dissatisfied customers. 3. The basic gigs are all $5, Scott Johnson no 8:46 <iframe width="320" height="24" src="http://computertutorflorida.com/?powerpress_embed=4640-podcast&amp;powerpress_player=default" frameborder="0" scrolling="no"></iframe> http://computertutorflorida.com/2012/11/get-rid-of-the-recycle-bin-warning/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=get-rid-of-the-recycle-bin-warning http://computertutorflorida.com/2012/11/get-rid-of-the-recycle-bin-warning/#comments Mon, 26 Nov 2012 08:00:04 +0000 Scott Johnson http://computertutorflorida.com/?p=4626 Read more »