Windows Tips

Today I received well over 200 virus-infected emails, courtesy of the W32.sobig.b@mm.html and Friendship Screensaver worm / virus. So, why do I get bombarded with email viruses more than the average Joe? The answer to my dilemma is compound. Since ... literally thousands of users have emailed me in the past ... and because mail programs such as Outlook / Outlook Express automatically save contacts [email addresses] once mail has been replied to, ... and and because most email viruses propagate through email Contact Lists: my email addresses have been become exceptionally targeted by email worms. ... (view more)

Last week, Douglas M. told me how the Address Bar disappeared from his Internet Explorer: " I am running Windows 98 (second edition) with IE6 and recently the address bar at the top of the browser screen has disappeared. When I click View -> ... Toobars -> Address Bar, I cannot get it to return. Any suggestions? " My response: I forwarded a link from TechTV: the site suggested that the Address Bar may have been inadvertently repositioned and, consequently, hidden. Recall: " If your address bar has disappeared from Internet Explorer, right-click on a toolbar and make sure ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Douglas M. writes: " Dear Dennis, I am an avid reader of your newsletter, and it is definitely the BEST free support publication for users of Windows operating systems -- I recommend Infopackets Gazette whenever appropriate! I ... wonder whether you can help me with a problem? I am running Windows 98 (second edition) with IE6 and recently the address bar at the top of the browser screen has disappeared. When I click View -> Toobars -> Address Bar, I cannot get it to return. Any suggestions? " My response: I was unable to find a resolution to this problem by ... (view more)

Rezzy47 asks: " I'm running Windows XP Home Edition on a Dell 8200 Desktop computer. Every time I attempt to run ScanDisk [CHKDSK] on one of my hard drives, Windows gives me the message, ' Please wait while windows restarts ... ', but never does. I ... have to shut the computer down manually by turning off the power. Is there any solution to this problem? " My response: I know that the "shut down" feature under Windows hasn't worked properly since the days of Windows 95 ... but I figured that Microsoft licked this problem once-and-for-all with Windows XP. I guess not. ... (view more)

Last week , Rocky R. asked how to turn on the AutoComplete feature found in Internet Explorer. A quick recap: what is AutoComplete? When enabled, the AutoComplete feature remembers (and completes) frequently used form data on web pages. An example ... of a form might be one that asks you a name and password, such as the login form used at Hotmail.com. After providing instructions on how to enable / disable the AutoComplete in last week's newsletter, I furthered the discussion by introducing a dilemma of my own. My problem was that I sometimes have to revert back to an old image (backup) of ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader John S. writes: " Quite often, my web browser displays gibberish characters throughout the entire web page, instead of the web page itself. I have to refresh the screen (sometimes repeatedly) to get the page to display correctly. ... This also sometimes happens to my emails, too. I did a clean reinstall of Windows, but it didn't help. Any suggestions? " My response: I was plagued with a similar problem for quite some time. After upgrading to Windows XP, my old firewall program (Black Ice) didn't work properly. I decided to replace Black Ice with Zone Alarm ... which ... (view more)

Yesterday, Bill B. sent me a question regarding Adobe Acrobat Reader. Wait a sec -- what is Adobe Acrobat Reader? Acrobat Reader is a free-to-use tool which reads documents which contain the file extension ".PDF". The Portable Document Format has ... been around for quite some time and is supported by all major computer platforms (PC, Mac, Unix, OS/2, etc). Acrobat is a popular pick among eBook developers because it provides many useful features, including: document encryption (IE: the ability to copy-protect all / certain aspects of a document), bookmarks, clickable links, clickable ... (view more)

A few days ago, Ramnik S. asked how to alphabetically sort favorites (web page bookmarks) using Internet Explorer: " Hi Dennis! I thoroughly enjoy your newsletter. I find it informative and, even more importantly, fun to read! I have one question ... regarding the Favorites in Internet Explorer. Over time, as I keep on adding new favorites, the list of favorites no longer remains in alphabetical order. Under 'Organize Favorites', other than manually moving each address, there does not seem to be a way of automatically getting the list in alphabetical order. Is there a simple way to do this ... (view more)