Windows 7

When Microsoft released its new operating system Vista, it met a storm of resistance, which generally boiled down to two big problems - it required a very fast computer and scads of memory to run all the features, which for a lot of people would have meant a serious upgrade of their computer; and there were a lot of incompatibilities with existing hardware, eg printers, modems, sound and video cards, etc. While most of the incompatibilities have since been sorted out, the memory problem is still a major one. Hence, a high proportion of XP users are clinging desperately to their operating system. So much so, that Microsoft was forced to extend the length of time it would support XP. Vista still has not attracted the user base that Microsoft was expecting, and the ongoing problems forced it to hasten development of a replacement operating system, dubbed Windows 7. Development of this is well advanced, and several million people downloaded a free trial (called a "beta"), which has generally attracted good reviews. As Pat Pilcher wrote in the NZ Herald:

Having used Windows 7 Beta for the better part of two weeks, I'm pleased to report it takes Vista's strengths and manages to fix most of its annoyances. I'd even go as far as saying that Windows 7 is perhaps one of the most complete and bomb-proof betas I've ever used.

It looks like a lot of people will leapfrog Vista, and hang on to XP until they can upgrade to Windows 7 when it is finally released (and I will almost certainly be one of them, unless I have already ditched Microsoft completely and switched to Linux, which I am more tempted to do by the day).

Cyborgs soon a reality?

So you thought the Cyborgs of Star Trek were fanciful imagination. We may be closer to the reality than you realise, if this article in the NZ Herald is to be believed:

"Intelligent nanorobots will be deeply integrated in our bodies, our brains, and our environment, overcoming pollution and poverty, extending longevity, and creating full-immersion virtual reality (think The Matrix), "experience beaming" (Being John Malkovich), and vastly enhanced human intelligence. The result will be an intimate merger between the technology-creating species and the technological evolutionary process it spawned."
"That's just for starters. Soon after, claims Kurzweil, "Non-biological intelligence will have access to its own design and will be able to improve itself in an increasingly rapid redesign cycle. We'll get to a point where technical progress will be so fast that unenhanced human intelligence will be unable to follow it. That will mark the singularity."
Kurzweil's point is that we don't know what happens next and, perhaps more importantly, we're not really geared up to the challenges that any of these developments present - though the "singularity" may be only 35 years from now.

And I thought I couldn't cope now!!

Internet down?

Last night, our internet connection just suddenly stopped. My first recourse was to right click on the connection icon at the right-hand side of the task bar and first check status ("offline" - huh! I know that), and then repair. It couldn't repair. Then I had a flash-back and remembered a time several years ago when the same thing used to happen fairly regularly at my workplace. When the internet there went down, we would disconnect the power from the modem, wait 10 seconds, then plug the power back in. This resets all the settings. So I dived under my desk, and did the same. Voila! Internet back in action.

Starting in safe mode

While the XP and Vista operating systems don't crash nearly as much as their predecessors, they still freeze from time to time. More commonly, a particular program refuses to work the way it should. The first line of attack is to simply restart (reboot) the computer, and most often that solves the problem (which in that case probably was to do with fragmented memory, or a conflict between two pieces of software). If that doesn't work, the next option is to reboot in "safe mode". This is a bare-bones working mode that disables all extensions, including printer drivers, internet, etc, and is a good mode in which to do trouble-shooting. Oftentimes, simply starting in safe mode and then rebooting in normal mode without doing anything else solves the problem. To reboot in safe mode, hold down the F8 key at the top of your keyboard while starting the computer. You will get some beeps, and the screen will show only black with white writing. At some point, it will stop and offer you three choices to continue. One of these is the safe mode, and you use the arrow keys at the right of your keyboard to choose this, and then press "Enter" to continue. When the computer is in safe mode, the screen operates at a lower resolution, which means all your icons will be bigger, and when you restart in normal mode, you will have the fun job of resorting all the icons.
Some people have difficulty with Firefox freezing, which may be caused by conflict between extensions and add-ons. You can also start Firefox in safe mode, which disables the extensions, and you can then turn them on one by one, to find out which is the culprit. You will find the safe mode by going to Start/Programs/Mozilla Firefox.

Anonymous surfing

A surprising amount of information about you can be gathered as you surf the Web - including the kind of computer and operating system you use, the sites you've visited recently, your location, and possibly your company. This comes about in several ways. For instance, when you are on the internet, your computer is allocated a unique numerical address called an IP address. Records of this are kept by your internet service provider, and can be accessed by people wanting the information. Some less scrupulous people sell lists of these. Another way is for the web page to plant a "cookie" in your computer, which it can then track. Most cookies are fairly benign - for instance, it tells a site whether you have visited before, and saves you having to provide a password every time you visit.
There are various ways to keep your surfing information private. One is to use what is called a proxy server, essentially an internet site that you log on to, which then disguises your computer's IP address, so it can't be traced. Another is to use programs like Tor, which is a free program that takes all of your Internet communications and sends them around a large network of "onion" routers that make it impossible for sites or people to invade your privacy. There's lots more info on this at the Tor site.