FAQS! FACTS! FAX! 105 (16/04/98)

MAC TO THE FUTURE

Boot camp 13's insight into the Macintosh world made no mention of the millennium situation. As you pointed out we Mac users never see blue screens, incomprehensible error messages, etc., but can you remind us what we will see in 2000?

Ian Fitzgerald

A

A rather smug expression, when you gaze in the mirror on the morning of Saturday January 1, 2000… As Mac owners never tire of reminding us poor benighted PC users, their operating systems are fully aware of the year 2000, and have been since the first Macs appeared in 1984. The battery-operated clock chip inside all Apple Macintoshes calculates time and date information by counting the number of seconds elapsed since midnight, January 1, 1904. Early models will remain trustworthy until 6:28 am, on February 6, 2040. Current Mac’s time and date utilities cover dates from 30081 BC to 29940 AD.

REMOVAL TWEAK

I understand the importance of using the Add/Remove Programs utility in Control Panel, to safely delete programs, but only after I had already made the mistake of removing a program, via the Recycle Bin. I now realise that only part of the program was deleted; is there anything that I can do to remove the remaining bits? Add/Remove Program still lists the program, but the Uninstall button is now greyed out.

David Buckley, London N5

A

If your system is behaving normally it’s probably best to leave well alone, or buy a removal program, like WinDelete, Uninstaller or CleanSweep. You can safely edit the Add/Remove Programs list, to delete the names of long-departed programs, using our old friend Tweak UI. That’s just one of the many talents of this remarkable little utility program, part of Microsoft’s Powertoys suite. It is regularly featured on computer magazine cover discs (PC Pro includes it on theirs every month), or it can be downloaded free of charge from the Microsoft web site: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ download/powertoy.exe

COMING CLEAN

Can an uninstaller program remove applications that were installed before it was installed, if you see what I mean? The ones I have looked at suggest that the uninstaller has to be running when an application is put on the computer, so that they know how to remove the programs that I wish I'd never installed. How can I uninstall software which the Windows 95 uninstaller does not give me the option of uninstalling? Help.

Matthew Chamings

A

When you have an uninstaller program running on your system it monitors new software, noting where the files are stored, so they can be completely removed. Nevertheless, uninstallers work retrospectively, as it were, though there’s a chance some bits of a program may be left behind. However, these ‘orphaned’ files should be found by the clean-up utilities included on most uninstallers.  

EMAIL SECURITY

I want to send a sensitive document to the USA, and have thought of including it as an enclosure to an Email. What are the risks of someone in UK (or anywhere else) seeing it, either deliberately or by accident?  Clearly, it must go onto my ISP's server and onto the server of the recipient's ISP. How long does it stay at any of these sites where I assume vulnerable to snooping or interception? Is it deleted as soon as the recipient says 'Delete',  and how much would the use of password protection alter the vulnerability?

J. E. J, Plans

A

Although all UK and US Internet Service Providers claim a high degree of confidentiality at their ends of an Internet connection, there is no way of knowing what route your message takes, what happens to it whilst it is in transit, and how long it remains on any of the server computers it passes through. The only safe way to send files is to encrypt them and provide the recipient with a ‘key’ to unlock the file, when it has been downloaded onto their PC. Even so, no encryption system is 100% secure, though some, like PGP (Pretty Good Privacy), is so good that it takes a powerful supercomputer a long time to crack it. Any person or organisation wanting to read your Email would have to be very determined, and very well equipped. PGP is a freeware program, various versions, that will operate on a wide range of computers and operating systems are available from numerous sites around the Internet. You will find a good overview of PGP and encryption, plus links to various download sites at: http://www.pgpi.com

INTRA-SPECTIVE

Can you please tell me the difference, if any, between the Internet and an Intranet? I have always assumed that they were the same, and that Intranet was a miss spelling of Internet. However, I have seen the word Intranet so often recently that I am having doubts.

G. A. Booth, Epsom, Surrey

A

An Intranet is a private or company computer network that looks and functions like the Internet. Intranets use the same kind of system for transferring files as the Internet, (known to its friends as Transmission Control Protocol over Internet Protocol or TCP/IP) and desktop PCs use Internet-like browser software to access and retrieve information.

PALMED OFF

I wish to buy a palmtop computer to pick up my Email when abroad. I have been told that every time I wish to switch between receiving Email on my desktop PC and on a palmtop I will need to reconfigure the computer. Is this true? Is there no palmtop or Internet provider that allows me to simply pick up Emails from either system without fiddling about with configurations?  

Alan Newton

A

Palmtop PCs do not have the memory, processing power or screen performance to run the kind of Internet browser and Email software that you’re using on your desktop PC. Palmtops also use proprietary operating systems; historically there were lots of them, and they usually didn’t hang around long enough to make it worthwhile for software developers to devise fully featured E-mail programs. That may change following the rapid increase in the number of Windows CE palmtops. However, at the moment the situation is that you can download your Email from CompuServe by changing the way the ISP software handles your incoming Email. However, once you have made the change (it’s explained when you make the initial connection via a palmtop), you can’t easily go back.

Alternatively you might want to think about changing your ISP, to one that can deal with palmtop connectivity (but not AOL or MSN who are even less palmtop-friendly than CompuServe) or buy a sub-notebook PC, like the Toshiba Libretto, which is currently selling for less than £1000. It’s only a little larger than most palmtops but it has a Pentium processor, runs Windows 95 and your current Internet access program.

SOUNDING OFF

Notwithstanding that all computers have cooling fans, my new PC is noisier than any other I’ve heard. It has been back to the manufacturer and checked, and to the showroom, where it was as quiet as any on display. I have tried moving it around the house but when in situ (on a commercially sold wooden workstation) it can easily be heard from a distance of eight yards.

William McNally, Wilmslow, Cheshire

A

If, as it appears your PC’s cooling fan is not abnormally loud, it seems likely that the problem lies with the workstation, which is acting like a sounding board or baffle. Try standing the PC on a thin rubber mat or piece of foam-backed carpet.