Now and then paranoia sets and im sure big brother or some hacker is looking at my PC so now and then i check the Netstat command from the *Dos* prompt. Netstat (if you don't know) is a command tool to display active connections your PC currently has, both incoming and outgoing. But it does have its other users as well like i've just found out i've set Apache to listen of a couple of extra ports i forgot about. If you do want to run it you'll see the information restrictive so run the following

The gives you some extra info per connection

i.e.
-a Displays all connections and the listening ports
-b Displays the exec involved with the connection

Microsoft have released the there new product from the Creature House takeover in 2003. At the moment called Acrylic it has now gone to beta. Its a free download (about 80mb) to anyone who has a Passport Account.

From the site: Acrylic" is the codename for an innovative illustration, painting and graphics tool that provides exciting creative capabilities for designers working in print, web, video, and interactive media.

It looks like Microsoft Office has gone the way of Open Office for its next change of file formats. The new file ext will be .DOCX, .XLSX, .PPTX and basically they will be .zip files (so they should be able to be opened with something like winzip), and will contain a bunch of XML files that you can look at. Microfsoft will also make the shema's and everything else fully assessable - believing that its the software which adds the value - not the file(format).

There is a cracking metaphor blog post about Security in Windows and how basically there isnt any.

Im not here to argue ( a.k.a flame war) if the Mac has better security than Windows (which from what i know it does) but at the end of the day im a PC user, and have been for too long time. Plus the company i work for is total Windows as well - making the switch is never as easy as just buying a new computer.

How many PC users have made scary looking canyon jump to Mac and not regretted one day? on the other hand who has come the other way, either by choice or forced because of software etc?

You never know maybe one day i might venture out and buy a cheap Mac one day.

I havent used MSSQL in a couple of years now, and even when i did use it wasnt for long. Well i needed a quick guide to MSSQL and found one on Sitepoint.com.

Its about an hour long and skips all the junk like installing - so if you need to play catch up check out:- sitepoint.com/article/sql-server-2000-database

A friend of mine (Hi Jordi) passed on a link for CF Vs Visual Studio .net?. I love these sort of columns, especially which are even sponsored by Microsoft. In a nutshell if you're on Windows, sticking with Windows, and never gonna consider moving from Windows, then .NET is the only option. Because if you want to develop/use Coldfusion you will need

1. "Web server software" err, by owning Windows (or not paying for Linux/apache) this is not an issue
2. To pay out for "Database software" - have i missed something or is .NET a DB as well??

End small rant.

A friend has just sent me this link to download the beta of Microsoft Anti Spyware.

Neowin was the first to break this a couple of day ago. The application offers real-time updates, scans/protection, and other advanced tools. One feature of the real-time protection is that it comes with 3 agents checking the Internet, Systems, and Applications, plus you can also restored hijacked IE settings. Worth a look if you are on the MS platform - i mean (i know this will bite me back in the ass) who is better to clean windows than Microsoft themselves - no flames please :o)

You can find out more at MS at: http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx

Well after my Xbox purchase and walking around the shops looking at them for over a month or two deciding if i needed one i finally brought an iPod. I got the 20gb model which holds something like 5000 songs, and all i can say is COOL! I didnt think they were worth the hype, but they are!! If you havent got one yet and thinking i might just get a cheaper MP3 player, don't! the playlist, album, genre, artist, composer break down lists make it work it alone. Plus even iTunes simplicity is making me move away from Window Media player.

I still don't think i'll use iTunes to buy music as i like having the real thing, and i do still use those near outdated things called CD's

Well im back, i took a little time away from any coding and rebuilt my workstation with 2003 (XP's pro IIS isnt the best). This also gave me a chance to "reclaim my inbox" and finally dump Outlook to switch to Thunderbird, and i'm glad i've done that.

The install went well all except for my ATI graphics card. This was due to W2k3 basic setup with lack of Grahpics acceleration. Thats when i came across "Convert Windows Server 2003 to a Workstation. Not only did it solve a few grapic issues, but you can also find other information there about sound acceleration, themes, adv.configuration and the Shutdown Tracker!

On top of that - Happy New Year to all

-- Microsoft Corp. today released a new security patch for its Internet Explorer (IE) - find out more here

Just been looking to install a SSL on my Win XP Pro IIS 5.1 and came across at Microsoft

If you are using IIS 6.0 and need to install a certificate for testing or internal use, you can do it in about 2 seconds with the use of the SelfSSL utility from the IIS 6 Resource Kit. Just type SelfSSL at the command line and it will instantly install a self-signed certificate on the default web site. You can install a certificate on other sites and control the contents of the certificate including the common name and expiration date using command-line switches. See the SelfSSL documentation for exact details.

If you are not using IIS 6 yet, then you can use the SSLDiag tool available from the Microsoft Download Center. Be sure to download the full setup.exe package in order to get the SSLDiag documentation. To install a certificate on a web site, right-click the Web site level (shown by [W3SVC/]) in the main window of SSL Diagnostics, and then click Create New Certificate. This tool does not give you the ability to customize the certificate, but does allow you to install an automatically-generated certificate - intended to be used for testing purposes

You can find the original page with all this and more here

If you like me, didnt want to pay for MSN messengers calendar service good news its now free. Whether this was because of lack of use or just to add features to out-do the competition i dont know. Either way worth checking out - just login to your hotmail account.

If you've noticed a program has stopped working after installing XP SP2 then you might just want to check out this http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=842242

Well i downloaded the 266mb download and have just installed it on my this PC. It took some time check my system, backup and apply changes, but it got there. There's a couple of big changes that are noticable straight away like the Firewall, plus V5 of Windows Upadate. But the total amount of fixes is something like 850+, but thats just my rough guess taken from this list - http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;%5bLN%5d;811113

WOW!

There's a slow wait for this as it gradually get rolled out via Windows Update, but anyone looking at downloading it seperately can do so here : http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=049C9DBE-3B8E-4F30-8245-9E368D3CDB5A&displaylang=en

Ok so the title line is a lie, but come on, how many of you knew what i was talking about when i said "that" email. The only reason this piece of spam came to mind was because of a recent article on Wired. Incase you don't know about "that" email let me explain first:

The email promised for whatever reason you'd get money of Mr. W. Gates. It went something like

Hello everybody, My name is Bill Gates.

I have just written up an e-mail tracing program that traces everyone to whom this message is forwarded to. I am experimenting with this and I need your help. Forward this to everyone you know and if it reaches 1000 people everyone on the list will receive $1000 at my expense. Enjoy.

Your friend,
Bill Gates


By the way there are 1000's of variations on this, but the same theme of something for nothing.

Back to what i was saying. So if you read the article you can find some classic quotes like:
"Janet Randall, director of the linguistics program at Northeastern University, received it from a friend and forwarded it to 64 people (promised earnings: $13,001.60) because of the lawyer's assurances."
I thought everyone by now everyone knew about these? Does this mean that someone out there is actually putting £5 in an envelope, sending it to the next 5 people on the list and adding his/her name to the bottom?

But there is an acutely bigger issue i see here. Personally common sense takes over and sense "yeah right!!", but that's probably because of long exposure to the web for quite a few years now, maybe the lure is to great for the newbie. Either way that email could quite of easily said "Open this application from Microsoft and earn money" - virus loaded, keys logged, and everyone in your contacts emailed!!! If the message about hoaxes is not getting out there, nor what we as developers see as common sense is not prevailing then how can we think that virus writers are going to have a hard time? I don't know who (but ISP's and Microsoft would be a start) but there needs to be a lot more basic education on how to use the web!



If you want to know more about the hoax email go here. By the way Snope.com is one of the most excellent sites on the web for finding out about weird true facts and some classic hoaxes

Hotmail have now jumped on the extra storage bandwagon as have Yahoo. This Autum (Fall), will see the inbox rise to 250mb (2gb if you pay $19.99) and you can send 10mb attachments.

Makes you wonder if they could always offer this, or wasting some more money to play catch up?
Source: Unoffical Google Blog or login into your Hotmail account.

OpenHack, 8 Months and not defaced. Which is good when you conisder they are trying to be defaced.

What they are trying to show is that you can have a windows 2000 (though i think they have just upgarded to 2003 web edition) production server which is hard to crack. At the moment its not the truest of representaion of a web server i.e. its only server static HTML. But still with a little imagination (Apache instaltion and docs on a USB pen) and ingenuity anything is possible - including making Windows a safe enviroment

I came across this handy tool today which allows you to log into MSN Messenger without the client. Handy if you are at work and they dont allow you the client.

http://www.e-messenger.net/

There's been a lot of talk recently about Microsoft's plans to ban incorrectly licensed (ok, pirated) versions of Windows XP using the soonish to be released Service Pack 2. Don't get me wrong, piracy is wrong, no two ways about it. But if we are to stop (or at least slow down) virus writers we need all machines need to be protected. Microsoft are not going to stop users acquiring a pirated copy of Windows but by disallowing a service pack to be installed they will create an abundance of machines that are ready to be hacked/cracked and used to damage other systems. By disallowing SP2 it will only help the spread of viruses and cause more damage to Microsoft reputation, rather than damaging the pirated copy's of XP and there users
The bigger picture here is the amount of un-patched systems out there at all levels. Microsoft resources would be better spent making sure "all" users aware of updates and services packs. All of the PC's that i give free 24/7/365 telephone support (you know the ones, family and friends), those users are not aware of how important it is to keep Windows regularly updated, and probably not even aware that you do.

Ok, end of minor rant :o) I know this is heated and all comments welcome. My concern here really is stopping the influx of viruses coming through mine and yours inbox and destroying data, stealing personal details and generally causing havoc.