So it has apparently been long enough for me to forget the headaches that I had the last time I tried to use Linux. Last night I installed SuSE. You can find it here.
I will write more as I loose more hair.
In the past, I have mentioned software that I use or have used for various purposes but I dont think I have ever really posted a concise list of programs.
1. Obviously the first thing listed should be the operating system that I choose to use. I have in the past, experimented with several versions of Linux, namely Red Hat, Mandrake and Suse (only once and it didnt work out that well between us). 99% of the time, a version of Windows has been installed on my computer. I use Windows XP Pro currently and I am happy with how it works and what it does for me. Being in the industry I am in, I know that there are better operating systems out there. However, I also do know that a vast majority of computer owners use Windows. I choose to use, recommend and repair Windows rather then Linux or Apple's OS' simply due to the sheer proliferation of the market by Windows.
Windows
Red Hat and Fedora Core
Suse
Mandrake
(I just found out that Mandrake is now called Mandriva after a company merge).
2.After the operating system choice, the next program I would recommend is an email client. Now again I am going to go with the Microsoft product. I use Outlook for my mail. I have in the past tried Thunderbird from Mozilla and I have tried and used Eudora for my emails, but neither product seemed to really do what I wanted and they seemed to have a slightly less then polished look. Many people have said that Thunderbird is the email program to use and several times I have given it another chance, to see if perhaps I didnt give it enough time to grow on me, and time and time again I go back to Outlook. I suppose that I choose Outlook for the fact that Microsoft has thrown a lot of development into Outlook. But mostly it just seems to be personal preference.
3.A game is my next often used program. World of Warcraft has dominated my computer for almost a year now. Taking over like a big fat sumo wrestler in a sushi shop. Shauna now plays the game more then I do, but I do manage to get in an hour or three a week when I have the time.
4. I have already recommended spyware and adware removal tools for you to use and I think that anti-virus software comes down (in part) to personal preference. Norton products work well for most folks, but older machines have trouble with Norton. I have in the past suggested AVG as an alternative to Symantec products. AVG is a good solid tool for keeping viruses off your computer. AVG has a small footprint and tends to run well on almost all machines regardless of system resources.
Well thats a lot of chatter for this morning. I think I will end this post here and get back to work.
Purchasing
Rule 1: Research. Do lots of research. You need to know what your looking for before you buy it. Most salesmen are not crooks, but rather just trying to get the sale. So they will try to sell you what they can, not what might be best or best for you. If you walk into a computer store knowing what you want and why you want that particular item, then your ahead of the game.
Rule 1b: Know what your buying. If you dont know what your buying then you might as well buy a typewriter.
Rule 2: Be prepared to spend more then you initially thought. If you planned to spend say $1,500, then you will more then likely spend about $500 more. Not because your getting screwed over, but because of some of the things you might have forgotten about. Dont walk in and force the sales person to get you a whole machine and all the parts for EXACTLY that amount. If you do this, you could end up getting parts that are not the best for you. Purchasing a new computer is an expensive ordeal and has to be done carefully or else you could end up with trouble down the road.
Rule 3: Get the longest most comprehensive warranty that your computer store sells and then get them to spell out EXACTLY what it means and what its limitations are. You must know what your responsibilites are as a owner and what your store will and most importantly, will not cover. You need to understand your computer has hundreds and hundreds of moving parts and that anything with a single moving part has the chance for failure of some kind. When a part fails, it isnt that your computer store sold you a piece of junk, but just that a group of moving parts failed to keep moving properly.
Owning A Computer
Rule 1: Keep it clean. You as a computer owner, like a car owner, have a responsibility and obligation to keep your computer clean. Your warranty for both your car and your computer can be voided if you dont do regular clean ups. Once a month, purchase a can of compressed air and use it to blow out all the dust in your computer. Put the nozzle that comes with the can into any hole in your computer case you can and blow. If you feel confident enough, take the side of the case off and really clean out the insides. Two things to be careful off; any place where you have a fan that moves, try to avoid moving them with the compressed air. Moving these fans in the wrong direction can ruin them and possibly kill your computer.
Rule 2: Keep it Clean. Keeping your computer clean of viruses and sypware/adware will help you enjoy your computer longer. Using some of the tools that I discussed last week, you will keep your computer free of most problems if not all. Part of keeping your computer virus and spyware free is knowing what your installing. Many programs that "look cool" or that are fun to use, have something in them that might not be good for your computer. Incredmail is a prime example. This is a popular email program. However, it comes with some advertising programs that while in themselves are mostly harmless, they do in fact let in other bad things and then its all down hill from there. Incredimail, in and of itself, is no bad thing, but it does allow more problems in later.
Rule 3: Keep your computer updated. Regularly head over to Microsoft's web site and look for recent updates and security patches. By keeping your computer up to date and all the security holes filled up, you help save other computers. When your computer has a security flaw in it, your computer have the ability to reinfect other clean computers. Your computer can act as a infection point for hundreds of thousands of other computers.
These are pretty simple rules and are easy to follow. Following them can help keep you and your computer happy for the years that you own it.
Well, no new MT today.
But I thought I would take the time to link to a few tools and web sites again for those folks who come here.
Ad-aware is probably the best spyware/adware removal tool out there. Ninety percent of all trouble people have with their computer that is software related comes from spyware and adware. Most spyware comes from general internet surfing. While surfing on most pages you will pick up at least a dozen or so tracking cookies per page and if you head to any sites that sell items or do some heavy advertising, you could pick up something more.
(Begin aside)
Today, tomorrow and Saturday are our Customer Appreciation Days and I have been given a god awful red t-shirt to wear today. I thought it was bad enough to wear the blue shirts they make us wear but I was so wrong. Already there have been two people making "red shirts from star trek" jokes and I have no doubt I will hear it a couple times more from some customers. Sigh. I hated having to wear stupid uniform stuff when I was at the Bay and now I have to wear _this_. Damnit.
(End aside)
Using Adaware at least every other day, will save you from a huge amount of trouble. If your like me and you surf a lot to a lot of different pages, then you may want to use it a little more often.
You can down load Ad-aware here.
Another good tool to use is Spybot. Now when this tool first came to my attention it was something that I have to admit, I scoffed. I didnt think that it was a good tool and that using did more harm then good. Well I was wrong.
When doing a large amount of surfing to sites that will obviously generate spyware trouble for you or if you have been surfing for a long time and you notice that you are having trouble, you can use Spybot AND Adaware and do a much more thorough job. Now, both of these tools will not clean your machine completely, but it should do a good enough job to get you up and running and back on the internet and into more trouble.
You can get Spybot here.
Check back for more useless crap from my head.
I liked the sound of that. Kind of sounds like a horror movie.
Hmm, work as a horror movie. It certainly sounds like this place.
Ok, so today sucked a lot. Kevin is away on holidays, Jeff is due back tomorrow and Ray has spent all of today out doing onsite calls.
Despite being swamped with phone calls, paper work and customers dropping machines off, I did manage to actually get some stuff done today.
I am now very eagerly awaiting the release of the next public version of Movable Type. 3.2 is due out very soon, as the final beta release was put out yesterday or the day before. With the release notes for the final beta version was the statement that they were eagerly looking forward to the public release which they hoped would be very soon.
I am beginning to feel that perhaps I would like to get into the meat and bones of the blogging tool I use and the actual act of blogging a little more. I want to try and make this (waves hands around blog) something more serious. I will turn on comments again and track backs and try and get them managed a little better. The only real drawback to me blogging all the time is the look of the site. I dont like it and I have never found a look that has kept me happy at all. There are a couple web sites out there that I desperately wish I had the skill to duplicate.
Well, its look like my day is wrapping up here. Time to escape as best I can.
Don't you hate it when you come into work on a Monday (or your equivalent day of the week that comes after your days off) and you hit the ground running? I love it! (NOT)
The minute that I came in, there was a LOT of stuff to take care of. It is now one hour later and the shit is starting to pile up and I am ALL by myself. Two tech's are on holidays, one of whom is back tomorrow and one is gone for two weeks. The ONLY other person that is in service to help out is gone ALL morning and it's really pissed me off.
The Sunday was ok. I slept in till 10 and spent most of the morning playing on the computer, something I havent done in a long, long time. After a few hours of that, I got tired and had a nap until about 5ish.
Sigh...work calls, more later maybe.
This article is pretty good and very smart. It talks about what you can do to protect yourself and your computer from trouble. All of it makes sense and is easy enough to do on your own. The only thing I think is a little off is the "dont use windows" suggestion. 90% of "average" users use Windows, mostly those people who work in offices and in some schools. (Note that I am aware that this is a huge sterotype and generalization), I think its better to try and suggest ways to make Windows as safe as it can be.
Go here for nice pictures of a bridge in Vancouver.
Been reading about this all over the internet for the last couple of days, it appears that Blockbuster is going to be doing away with late fees. You can read one of the many articles written about this bit of news here.
Something very interesting is happening over at Google these days. It appears that the search engine giant is making a bold move to begin the digitization of a large collection of books from serveral universities in the united states and england. This bit of information comes right on the heels of Google beginning Google Scholar Search (see it here). I think this an absolutely brilliant idea. When the "Internet" first began, it was a collection of universities and labratories connected together for the purpose of exchanging information. Now the Internet is a place to get cheap V i agra or pron. It will be good to see some literature out on the highway.
This is my life. It's sad but true.
So on November 23, on my lunch hour, I went and got the Collectors Edition for World of Warcraft. I had played in the stress test earlier in the year and was completely floored by what I saw. The graphics are pretty amazing for my computer (read: piece of junk) and I could only imagine that they would be awsome for a newer computer. The sheer scale of the game universe is unbleiveable. Basically there are two large continents to play on and I do me LARGE. The icing on the cake for me during the stress test was the sound, the soundtrack for this game is amazing.
Flash forward to this past Tuesday. I ran over to Future Shop and purchased my copy of the Collectors edition, which contained the following:
The full game on both CD-ROM and DVD-ROM
1-month subscription to World of Warcraft
The Art of World of Warcraft, 200+ page hardcover art book
World of Warcraft Behind-the-Scenes DVD
Exclusive in-game pet
Official soundtrack
Cloth map charting the continents of Kalimdor, Azeroth, Khaz Modan, and Lordaeron
Signed Collectors Edition game manual
10-Day Free Guest Pass invite one of your friends to join the epic quest
(See a picture here)
I tell you, the day could not end fast enough for me and that damn game sitting there (opened of course). I got home that night and installed it and played it for a bit and it was even better then the stress test had been.
The first few days have been filled with the usual first day stuff for an online game. The servers that Blizzard had set up for the game were no where near enough to handle the number of players that ended up on the servers. While I had no complaint about it (250,000 bought the game the same day I did and all tried to log on the same time I did, what was supposed to happen), many others did, like this:
ok ive had it!!, for the past 5 days i have had almost no playing, the only time i have had to play was in between 2-6 AM. and thats only because its a holiday! i have had to wait 40-50 minutes everytime i want to play this game, dont get me wrong i love it, but im not going to play a game the dissconnects me every so often just to sign back in and have to wait an hour, just to sign into a game that is so laggy i run in circles and cant see nothing but w/e ditch i end up in. im fed up with it, you released this game and i put up with it in beta, you need to fix this or reimburse me and my fellow peers. please do something i would rather play, but if i cant i want my 80 bucks i spent on the CE back.
or
THIS IS NOT A AMMUSEMENT PARK
END QUEUES NOW
OR I CANCEL Simple as that
And those are the polite ones. The forums for the game are filled with people going on and on about how mad they are. Now, when I logged on the other night and I couldnt get to the server that I had started on, I looked through the realms list, found one that had a low population and then went on it and played. No waiting, no laq and no waiting in a line to get on. Now for various reasons some people dont want to do this and I can sort of understand why. But you would not believe the amout of people screaming obscenties at Blizzard on the forums over this. Many people demanding their money back or demanding that Blizzard fix it RIGHT NOW.
Sigh.
For me, I have had only one crash and only a little bit of lag. I have NO complaints about this awsome game and can only say that it was worth the money I spent to get it.
I would wrap up this entry with some personal news, but, you have read it all now. Hehe, I have been working, eating, sleeping and playing World of Warcraft. I can only hope now, that they are beginning to work on World of Diablo.
I am about disappear for a while.
World of Warcraft is currently sitting at my feet here at work and I am using all of my self control to keep working and not rush home.
So, if there are no posts for a month, or three, you will know why.
Providing excellent service for computers that we sell, is something that we always try and preach. Our custoemrs are important and deserve good service. Now as I mentioned in the previous post, sometimes, customers have a hard time understanding that certain things are not covered under their warrranty. On occasion we choose to waive the labour for these people, simply because its easier to let them have $30 of labour for free then argue about it with them and possible loose the customer. It begins to get into a grey area at this point. How much service do you offer to a new customer to keep them happy?
Case in point: A customer brought in a laptop, not purchased from us but under warranty from the manufacturer. The computer was full of viruses and desperately in need of a serious cleaning and reinstall. One of our techs removed the viruses and sent it on its way. The lady returned a short while later and complained that the laptop would not start again. So, we looked at it and lo and behold, more viruses. Now she clamined that she shouldnt have to pay for the service since her laptop was still under warranty. Now this is flawed in two ways. One it wasnt even our warranty that she was wanting us to cover; and Two, viruses are never covered under any warranty at any time. Now, the question is, why did she think that it would be? Its possible that she thought that it SHOULD be coverd or that it WAS. Which is partly her fault for not fully reading all of the material that came with her computer and partly the fault of the salesman who sold her the computer for not making sure that she knew to read all of her documentaiton.
So what is the solution to these problems? The solution that would show the most immediate sign of working would be to make sure that the salesmen are properly education the people who buy new computers or computer products. Some customers may not want to hear it but they need to be made aware in advance what will be and what wont be covered by their warranty. The second solution, something that I myself have begun to implement is telling the customer upfront before any work is done. I tell the customer, before I do any work now, that software related issues are not covered under their warranty and that they will be billed for labour done. It's better that they get mad at this point rather then AFTER I have done all my work.
Lets see how it all works out.
Part I
In a previous post, I spoke about customer support and how important it is. In this post, I would like to kind of delve into obligations.
As a seller and producer of computers, we supply our customers with a 3 year warranty on all of our machines. This warranty covers parts and labour. Should your hard drive fail inside that time, then we can replace it for you at no cost to you. However, this warranty does not cover software on your machine. Should at any point you install a program and it makes your machine unusable, we charge the customer for support and for any repair bills. Now, over the last two weeks, I have had a handful of customers tell me that they dont want to pay for services that render while the machine is under warranty. Which is something that I can understand, you just purchased the machine and now it isnt working right and you want it fixed.
Part of the problem is the line of obligation. How much support are we, as the people who sold you the computer, obligated to give you, the person who bought the computer, for free? We installed Windows on your computer for you, but we are not Microsoft. If you have trouble with your Windows, you should call Microsoft. I know its easier to call us, but you shouldnt.
My biggest beef is with virus trouble. Almost constantly we are getting calls or having machines brought to us, for virus removal. Personally, I can not see how we, as the people who sold you the computer, are obligated to clean your computer of viruses for free. I think that part of the problem lies in our court. We provide the customer with a copy of their warranty and talk to them about what things the computer comes with, but we never say what obligations the user has. The user has the obligation to read their warranty and see that we tell them that certain things are not covered under their warranty and that certain things, such as not cleaning out their computer, can void their warranty.
I will finnish this off later, stay tuned!
Report states that 90% of computers have spyware infections.
Read it here.
Edit:
My bad, it actually says 80%.
Doing a little bit of tech support today. Nothing too complicated, just a little time consuming.
Right at this very moment I am watching Windows try and defrag itself (it has been checking the drive for errors for the last 30 minutes). Before that was a little spyware removal and after the very fun defrag, we will attempt to do a serious deep down virus check.
The computer in question is my dad's computer at his office. Its a few years old and is beginning to show some wear and tear, despite the fact it still does what it should for him, without chugging along too much. Most small offices these days dont really need the newest souped up machines. Most computers these days are doing fine in the low Pentium range.
The new hardware in computers is driven by games and media. Most offices dont need the kind of hardware that is out there now. Office software runs easy enough on mid range stuff and will be satisfied by 10 gigs of space. The problem that is met by most offices is that new developments to protect and save our data is met using newer operating systems and programs that dont run fully on older equipment and software.
Perhaps more care should be taken to make things work with what is out there rather then force people to buy newer stuff.
After testing out Red Hat and playing around for a few days, I decided to install Mandrake 9.1 on the computer and get to know it again. Well its been easy so far, although the install did seem to hang for a while for no apparent reason that I could see.
Dont have much time this morning so this will be a short post. More later tonight.
Well, here it is the aftermath and I have to say, I have as much hair as when I started. Yup, the installation went off far easier then I had hoped.
All of the third iso was downloaded when I got home from work yesterday and was ready to go. They all burned onto CDs easy enough and the only problem I have with them is that I dont have a damn CD pen to mark them with.
The install began with only two minor problems. The first occurred when I was trying to install to a empty disk on a extra ide controller and the install had a crash. The second time around I chose a couple different options and it went off without a hitch. I like the current Red Hat look and feel for the install process, very nice and smooth and I think I prefer it over the Mandrake stuff I have seen so far (Mandrake 10 is out there, and I have yet to see it). The total installation time took all of about two hours maybe. There were no driver errors or hitches and it was working right away.
This is the first time I have used Red Hat and I have to say I like it. The large icon look that is standard is different from Windows and done well without being stupid looking. I had thought that you could use the KDE desktop with Red Hat but the default is Gnome and I have yet to find a way to change it.
The longest part of the whole process was the installation of new packages. This took more then two hours and I had to leave it going when I went to bed. The installation of the new packages went off without a hitch and I was pleased to see that it didnt require me to reboot when it was done.
What comes next is learning how to install other applications, run stuff from the command line and generally work with Linux. As time goes by, I will post here and in Two Fishes about the experience.
Well, for some insane reason, I have forgotten the trouble I went through with my last attempt at Linux. I am going to try and install it again. The new Mandrake 10 will go onto the laptop and Red Hat 9.something will go onto the big computer along with XP.
I am still downloading Red Hat and I gave up trying to find the iso disk images for Mandrake. All the american ftps all have the binaries. I dont really want to download my disk images from thailand.
Anyway. I am really tired. Talk to you tomorrow morning.
...for a layout that works right for me. The layout your seeing on Monday, October 27 (cuz I have no doubt if you read this later on, it wont be the same layout) isn't coming up right in IE for some reason. The height of the main container isnt staying at 100% but is stopping where the links sections end. I will try and work on it when I get home from work tonight, although I have no idea what I will replace it with.
Readers!
I know your out there somewhere! I can sense you! But I dont know who you are! Please! Leave some sort of comment so I can get a better sense of who is coming to the site! Even if you think the site isnt any good (leave some sort of helpful suggestion then) say something!
I will TRY and do some writing tonight and tomorrow.
For those of us who are either new to this or not html and css wizards, the process of making a Moveable Type blog look perfect (to us) can be a painful and annoying process. This is an entry for me to test the ability of my categories listing.
I realize Css is more of a software type thing, but hey.
