gurk2005\’s blog

While reading emails today I noticed someone named Char emailed me to inform me of a Vista rumor. This might be true. With the many people who bought Windows Vista when it was first released back in January earlier this year (2007), people started to notice problems with Vista. Wanting to figure out what they can do either reading up on it or listening to conversations they might have heard about SP1 being released and taking care of those problems. Hearing that Vista SP1 is their only hope. Me with a number of people want to stay with Vista to see what is to come of it or at least stay around long enough to see what happens with Vista after SP1 is released.

Char informed me that eventually when SP1 is released it might cost us. Yes, I did say that we will have to pay for it. Keep in mind this is just a rumor. If it does come true how many of us will actually pay for it, and how many of us will move to something free like Linux? How many of us will remember what was like when Vista first came out with the bugs it had and feel convenient enough to give or money to Microsoft once again and trust that our money is going to buy us SP1 without any problems and will also fix all of our problems we are experiencing with Vista.

Keep in mind this is still just a rumor. Thank you Char for the news

The music industry must get a kick out of this. A virus that seeks out Mp3’s. Could they have had something to do in making it? No, I don’t think so. I could be wrong. Either way I am sure they are enjoying it.

Security experts have discovered a worm that hunts down and deletes Mp3 files on infected PCs.
Security companies say the worm is only low risk, although its unusual payload could give a nasty surprise to an ardent music fan. The motivation of the hackers who created it is unclear.

“The authors of this worm are more likely to be teenage mischief makers than the organized criminal gangs we typically see authoring financially-motivated malware these days,” said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for the security vendor Sophos PLC.
“As such, it’s not something we would lose an awful lot of sleep over, but there are some lessons that computer users should learn to minimize the chances of infection,” he said.
The worm spreads via removable flash drives, reminiscent of the way viruses spread via floppy disks decades ago. That may be an attempt by the authors of the worm to bypass e-mail filters and Web gateway filters that block malicious software, Cluley said.
Symantec Corp., which calls the worm W32.Deletemusic, said in an advisory the worm copies itself to all drives on a PC. It also creates and autorun file to start itself whenever a user accesses a drive.

The worm affects PC’s running all versions of Windows, Symantec said.

I don’t think that the music industry is behind this. Does it help them? 100% Yes. I am sure the music industry is thinking this will take care of illegally downloaded music, but it will also harm music download via iTunes, or any other legal music downloading service.

Vista… What can I say about Vista? For one it has a nicer look than Windows XP, but looks aren’t everything, sadly, but you can also get a program called Vista Transformation to make Xp look like Vista. Vista also has a nice search application, but as many Mac users would say “Mac had that years ago”. I used Windows Vista for around 2 months. The whole time I felt like I was trying to balance myself on a ball. Feeling as if it would crash any second. One wrong move and I’m done for. I felt safe on XP… maybe safe isn’t the right word to use while talking about Microsoft. Maybe I should say I feel safer on Windows Xp. Vista has had a number of problems with drivers not being available for certain programs. This will hopefully be figured out by the time SP1 (Service Pack 1) comes out for Vista later this year (2007) which I think by then or hopefully before then it will be figured out. At this point many people that I’ve spoken with that own or at least have used Vista have said it was a terrible time. The 90% of them have uninstalled Vista and installed another operating system or have downgraded back to XP. One day…a day that will soon be upon us Microsoft will soon not support Xp and then we will all have to give into buy Vista. Some of us might not, we might give into Steve Jobs and buy a Mac, and then again we might go for Linux. For those of you who only know of Mac and Windows there is an OS that is 100% Free. Yes, no lie. A free OS. Though it is different then Windows is you will eventually learn the OS. Until Vista becomes more secure for the normal everyday user I would recommend stay with Windows Xp or whatever you are using currently. So in the end would I use/try Vista again in the future..Yes, why not, I could use another headache.

Registry Hacking

Display legal notice on startup:
Wanna tell your friends about the do’s and dont’s in your computer when they login in your absence. Well you can do it pretty easily by displaying a legal notice at system start up.
REGEDIT
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE
\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\system]
“legalnoticecaption”=”enter your notice caption”
“legalnoticetext”=”enter your legal notice text”

I have done this in the past. It is very funny when you first see it.

If you’ve used Windows Vista for more than 3.7 minutes, you know what UAC (User Account Control) is.. it’s the obnoxious, nagging popup window that will be your life for the next 3-5 years unless you switch back to XP in frustration, or to a better OS like… OS X, Suse, Ubuntu, or even XP.

Note: Disabling UAC will lead to a less secure system, so be warned.

Windows need your permission to annoy the crap out of you:

There’s a quick way you can enable or disable this annoying window from the command line:

Disable UAC

C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe /k %windir%\System32\reg.exe ADD HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v EnableLUA /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f

Enable UAC

C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe /k %windir%\System32\reg.exe ADD HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v EnableLUA /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f

After you enable or disable UAC, you will have to reboot your computer for the changes to take effect.

Windows Vista users: Make a custom message display prior to logging into your PC. While IT departments often use this technique to show legal warnings and network policies, you can customize it to say whatever you want. Windows Fanatics explains the simple process.

1. Click Start, All Programs, Administrative Tools and Local Security Policy.
2. Expand Local Policies then Security options.
3. In the details pane double click Interactive logon: Message text for users attempting to log on.
4. Type in the message you want to appear.

Recently I was asked Tim how can I get rid of the horror browser which they called IE. Though it is not recommended in doing, it is possible to do. One reason people wish to get rid of IE is because they have found a better browser. Just because you find another browser to use there is no need for deleting the other. Some people say there are holes in IE. Which there may be. Some people say they want to uninstall IE because it opens when you open a link. If that is the case all you have to do is confirm which browser you want to be the default. Microsoft does not recommend uninstalling IE because they say you will not be able to get the updates for your operating system, not true, you can get a Firefox add-on called IE-Tab which will allow the Microsoft Updates to open in Firefox. Now onto uninstalling IE…

Uninstalling IE..
1.
Click Start, point to Settings, click Control Panel, and then double-click Add/Remove Programs.
2. On the Install/Uninstall tab, click Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 and Internet Tools in the list of installed programs, and then click Add/Remove.

Have fun surfing. And remember to use the right browser protection while doing so.

I’ve been recently doing some research around the Desktop Composition Engine (also known as the Desktop Windows Manager or DWM). It allows Longhorn to display Windows shell using cool transition effects, transparency and 3D. These effects are also known as “Aero Glass”. Last August, a registry hack was discovered by a member of the AeroExperience boards to enable these features in the WinHEC 4047 version of Longhorn

There have been many attempts to create usable interfaces in 3D. Many of them are listed on the following page: https://lg3d-core.dev.java.net/lg3d-related-technologies.html

Unfortunately, these Aero effects will only be available on the upcoming Longhorn Client. Contrary to popular belief, the November 2004 Avalon CTP does not allow Windows XP or Windows 2003 to natively mimic these effects. Joe Beda explained the reason for this in his blog - downlevel releases will not change any of the native Win32 binaries (http://www.eightypercent.net/Archive/2004/08/30.html). The Avalon CTP simply provides a new API to code against - 3D and transparency effects can be achieved within an app but not within the shell.

If you want Aero-like 3D capabilities on Windows XP, I would highly recommend trying out Sphere XP (http://www.hamar.sk/sphere/). As a power user, I typically multitask with dozens of Windows open at the same time. Sphere XP allow you to rotate, resize and position windows on a z-axis. Rather than try to explain the features to you, check out this page for several compelling screenshots: http://www.hamar.sk/sphere/sphereshots.htm

My personal experience with Justin.tv started back in late April. I found Justin.tv actually pretty cool. Took sometime to warm up to watching people doing basically the same thing’s myself along with everyone else does daily. The history of Justin.tv is pretty simple. It started out with a few friends and Justin Kan. Today (only a few months after it was started) it seems to be losing more and more fans. One reason could be not enough good content. Like a television station if the show isn’t good it gets canceled. That doesn’t exist with Justin.tv which is a good and bad thing at the same time. The good thing about that is no one with a channel has to be worried about what they are doing all of the time. They can just be themselves. The bad thing about that is if you are a new comer to the site you might get onto a channel that isn’t mildly exciting and think that all of the channels are like this. Which most are not. One question to be asked is maybe Justin.tv is approving too many channels at once without looking into what the content of the channel will be. Please don’t get me wrong I think in many ways what Justin.tv has been doing over the few months that they have been community is great. There are good and bad thing’s about every company, and every community. With the twenty or so people that have a channel with Justin.tv there are a small number so far that I feel are true to what and why they are doing this. Those of which I speak with be iJustine and GGJeffy. Both of them whom I speak of have made a connection with each and every friend not fan, but friend they meet and chat with. I don’t feel that the other rooms of that connection with there friends. It might be that they haven’t had enough time to make that connection with those in the chats. IJustine and GGJeffy, they are not doing this to just be online, just to be seen, and once again to the other Justin.tv channel members please don’t take this as a personal stab. This post is not meant to be read that way. I am sure others if not many enjoy the other channels that are provided by Justin.tv.

Many people have been asking me lately “I just installed Windows Vista from Windows Xp on my laptop and I notice my battery life has been draining a lot fast then when I had Windows Xp installed on it, What could it be?”. It has nothing to do with how you installed Windows Vista. So no need to reinstall or call Microsoft. The reason the battery life has been draining faster is the new Aero interface. By disabling the Aero feature the battery will last longer.

To disable the Aero theme do the following:

You can do this by right-click on your desktop and select Personalize from the menu. Choose Windows Color and Appearance and then click on open Classic Appearance Properties for more color options. Select a (non Aero) theme and then click apply.