dacs.doc electric

Random Access
September 2001

by Bruce Preston

Members who are unable to attend the General Meeting may submit questions to askdacs@aol.com -- they will be presented at the meeting, and the response(s) will be placed in the Random Access column. Q. Is there a way to print the address book from Microsoft Outlook Express 5? A. Yes - view the address book, then go to FILE then EXPORT. You will be given a list of exportable items, one of which is the address book (WAB - Windows Address Book). Be sure to look at the formats available - .TXT, .CSV (comma separated values) etc., as well as which fields you want to export. Q. The old Netscape Mail client stored its address book in ADDRESS.HTML - the new one seems to have it somewhere else. Is there a way to get the old values into the new one? I have moved the file from the old one to a similar folder in the new one - but it doesn’t find it. A. Look for an ‘import’ option. Also, you might want to go looking for the current version’s address book - and then do a manual merge. If you have a problem finding the address book, you might put in a fake and unique entry, such as "Bozo The Clown" and then do a FIND / Files and Folders / Containing Text and look for Bozo The Clown to see where they put the address. Q. I have a Compaq Presario computer which won’t let me defrag. I get a message SirC32.exe not found. A. We didn’t get a response during the meeting, but a follow-up on the internet revealed that you have been hit by the "SirCam" internet worm/virus. Go to http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/ data/w32.sircam.worm@mm.html for instructions as to how to remove it. Q. What is a CGI file? A. Common Gateway Interface - it is a file that usually exists on a web-server, and is executed as a result of a browser user either clicking the SUBMIT / SEND / POST button. It is usually written in one of the server script languages, such as Perl, PHP, Python, etc. Q. In Internet Explorer, if I quit Internet Explorer, I want my dial-up connection to drop. It doesn’t, and so unless I remember to check the system tray, I may have the connection stay live. How to I get it to drop? A. In the Internet properties, on the "Connection" tab, turn on the ‘Auto Disconnect’ option. Note, however, that other applications that might be running in the background may be active enough to keep the link open - some examples - RealPlayer, web-sourced wallpaper changers, etc. Q. Windows 2000 Pro, with a dial-up connection to SNET.NET. I can not log into my bank or PowerQuest. However, I can get to other places. If I use NetZero with the same browser, I can get to these locations. If I use my old machine, through SNET, I can get to these sites. If I use Netscape as my browser, I can get there as well. At one point I got a Java Script error. A. Call SNET, they are clearly doing something strange that IE doesn’t like. There is also a possibility that the SNET connection has a problem with its associated DNS server. One way to diagnose it might be to use the ‘tracert’ utility. The DNS server on your W2K machine may be using one DNS server, while the DNS server on the other machine(s) or under NetZero may be using a different one. Q. McAfee won’t scan e-mails because MAPI32.DLL is incorrect. A. McAfee e-mail only works if you are using MS Outlook (not Outlook Express) and you are connected to a MS Exchange Server. It just plain won’t work with SMTP servers. In reality, in-place client-side e-mail scanners don’t work. (By the way, this is essentially true for any vendor.) Your regular anti-virus will catch problems, but it won’t do it until you try to open the message rather than when you receive it. You must still have an up-to-date anti-virus signature file. Q. I get data from my CD, and can play audio CDs from my CD. However, I get no sound from CD-based applications, or any of the ‘standard’ windows sounds, such as at start-up. A. Best guess is that one or more of the sound sources has been disabled. Bring up the ‘volume controls’ and make sure that you show ‘all’ devices. Then see if any of them have the ‘Mute’ setting turned on. Q. Is there some software that would reveal that there is monitoring software running on my office machine? A. If your employer has installed something, then trying to remove it or perhaps even detecting it may very well fall under terms of employment. Q. On the internet, if I am working with Audio/Video, after a while the machine locks up. I have a 450MHz, 128MB RAM, Windows Me. A. Go to www.dslreports.com and try some of their tools to see if your system is optimally configured. Q. I have Amiga 1000 and Amiga 2000 machines available - is there any reason not to junk them? A. You might be able to find someone who wants them for parts, or nostalgic reasons. A check on eBay showed recent sales of Amiga 2000’s in the $275 to $325 range, and Amiga 1000’s in the $125 to $150 range.