WizGidget

Instant Messaging (IM), also called Internet Chat,  is a means of sending text messages to other people over a network.  There are several different IM tools available, all free.  The two most common are Yahoo! Messenger (YM) and AOL Instant Messenger (AIM), each using a proprietary protocol.  Google also offers IM via a standard protocol called Jabber/XMPP.  Microsoft does MSN, while IRC and ICQ are public IM protocols.  There are also several geared towards intranet use (internal to a company), such as SameTime, part of IBM’s Lotus Notes suite, and Novell’s Groupwise.  Even Skype, and Facebook  have their own IM.  Some of these IM tools can also provide voice and video connection, as well as file transfer.  Some can do “conferencing” where several people can participate in the same IM conversation.  Many cell phones can interface with YM, AIM or others.

I find IM very valuable for working with clients and associates.  Because the IM tool shows whether the person is online or not, it helps me to know whether someone is  available for a phone call.  Sometimes I just need to give them a short note that doesn’t warrant a phone call.  Also it can be a discreet way of communicating with someone, for instance if I’m on a conference call and need to tell a participant something private.  Spouse Ann and I frequently use IM to communicate when I’m away on a consulting engagement.  We also occasionally use the video call features of YM — it gives us a little face time, if (alas!) only virtual.

So, you decide you want to do the IM thing.  Which one to choose?  It really depends on who you’re wanting to IM with, and what tools they use.  99% of my IM is either YM or AIM, but mainly because that’s what my clients are using.  I have had a few clients using MSN or ICQ in the past.  I also have some clients that use SameTime, but those tend to be intranet (within the company) exclusively, and I don’t have access to their SameTime internal network.  If all your friends or family use one particular IM tool, that would be the one to pick.  It’s easy to sign up, just Google search for the tool you want (like “Yahoo Messenger”), go to their page and find the registration or new user link.

Maybe you’re like me and need to use several IM tools.  It can be pretty cumbersome to have 3 different messenger tools running at once.  Thankfully, there are a number of tools available that handle multiple IM protocols.  I personally use Pidgin, although others include Trillian, PSI, Adium, iChat, Kopete, and Miranda.  One drawback to these one-size-fits-all tools is that they often don’t handle video or do file transfer properly.  If I need to do video, I just disconnect that account in Pidgin, and run the IM specific tool like YM.

Next week: a look at the New Outlook Express.  Meantime you can find this and past articles at WizGidget.com

The term “Blog” is a contraction of the two words Web Log.  It’s a means of posting information on the internet.  For instance, the Wizgidget articles are simultaneously published in the Belton Journal, as well as on the WizGidget.com website.  Blog subjects range from technical like WizGidget to spiritual like spouse Ann’s NaturallyResilient.com to just about any topic you can think of.  Most blogs are mostly text, others include or are based on art, images, audio or video.  If you’ve heard of “Twitter”, it is a type of blogging called “microblogging” because it is composed of very short posts –140 characters for Twitter, including spaces, corresponding to the maximum length of a text message on your cell phone.  Twitter posts are generally sent via text message.

Why would you want a Blog?  There are actually quite a few people who make a living running a blog, by gathering and posting information that is important to a specific group of people.  The income is produced either through advertising or occasionally by subscription fee.  If a site is popular enough, the ads can produce significant income.  Malcom Gladwell would call these people “mavens” because they become respected brokers of valuable information, and that’s how they attract visitors to their site.  There are also people who like the idea of  having their very own street corner where they can stand on a soapbox and quite literally tell the world their opinions or share knowledge — without fear of being arrested for loitering or disturbing the peace.  I personally believe every Pastor should have a blog — it provides a forum for teaching their congregation, as well as exploring ideas and insights that might come up but aren’t ready for a full-blown sermon.  For instance Bishop Mike Lowry of the Central Texas Conference of the United has a blog: bishopmikelowry.com.  Not to mention that it can help boost the search ranking for the church website.

The hardest part of getting a blog is deciding among the bazillion choices.  There are hundreds if not thousands of free blogging websites, including Wordpress.com, blogspot.com and blogger.com  All you need is an email account, and you can sign up for a Blog site.  Wordpress has a plethora of styles (called “Themes”) you can choose from, and I’d guess that the others do as well.  The free blog sites are probably the way to go for casual internet users.  If you’re willing to take on a bit more of a challenge, mostly in the initial setup, I recommend getting your own domain and hosted web service.  The big advantage of doing it with your own domain is that you will then also have your own domain for email which can be very useful.  It’s fairly inexpensive, for instance Godaddy has an “economy” plan for $5/month that includes several choices for blog software, plus as little as $1/year (for a .info domain) for the domain registration.

Next week: Weblog Comment Spam.  Meantime, this and previous WizGidget articles are available online at WizGidget.com

Do you remember floppy disks?  I’ll bet a lot of my readers still have a PC with a 3-1/2″ floppy drive built in.  I remember the days of 5-1/4″ and 8″ floppies and even hollerith punch cards and punched paper tape.  Many moons ago I worked for a computer manufacturer based in San Antonio doing Sustaining Engineering — which means I cleaned up other people’s design messes.  One of the projects I worked on was integrating the new Winchester disk technology into an 8″ floppy product.  The Winchester disk stored a whopping 10 megabytes — as much as TEN of the 8″ floppies!  Wow!

That same company was a frontrunner in network technology, although they failed to market their best technology and  ended up falling behind other companies that were doing a better job of marketing lesser products.   That was before networking became as ubiquitous as it is today, so the common means of transporting information was via  floppy disks.  And not surprising, they were the primary vector for malware such as viruses.

The old floppy disks have pretty much been replaced with flash drives — what I call a thumbdrive, some people call them memory sticks.  I bought my first one about 7 years ago — a 512Megabyte for $65.  These days 4Gb drives can be had for under $10 and drives as high as 256Gb are available.

One thing that hasn’t changed is the security threat posed by portable storage.  According to Toralv Dirro of McAfee Labs, “..threats on portable storage devices took the lead as the most popular malware..” for the first half of 2010.  What makes this an insideous threat is the fact that Windows is configured to look for and automatically run software labeled as “AutoRun” on newly discovered storage — including the thumbdrive that your friend just plugged into your computer.  There’s a fairly easy fix for this — turn off AutoRun.  It’s a bit inconvenient at times, because when you insert a CD or DVD to install new software, it isn’t going to automagically start installing, although I’d say that’s less inconvenient than having your computer infected by an AutoRun-enabled virus.

First, you’ll need to make sure your computer is up-to-date on Windows updates.  Then, for WinXP, click Start, then click Run, and in the “open” dialog box that opens type in “gpedit.msc” and then click OK.  A “Group Policy” window will open.  Under the Computer Configuration in the left pane, expand “Administrative Templates” by clicking on the plus in the square next to the folder icon next to “Administrative Templates.  Next click on “System” to highlight it.  Scroll down in the right pane to find, and double-click on “Turn Off AutoPlay.”  Click the “Enabled” radio button, then click the OK button.  The window will disappear, and inserted CD’s DVD’s and thumbdrives will no longer automatically try to run — and potentially infect your computer with a virus.  The procedure is somewhat different for Vista and Win7, see the Microsoft Technote at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/967715 for more details.

Next week, we’ll talk about blogging.  Meantime this and past articles are available at wizgidget.com.