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Steve Blass

Dr. Internet

By Steve Blass

Blass is an IT manager in Phoenix. E-mail him.

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Protect your Cisco router against IOS rootkit software
05/27/08
What can we do to protect our Cisco routers against the IOS rootkit software that was described at the EUSecWest conference last week?
Browser-based AJAX application-building tool is easy to use
05/21/08
Can you recommend an open source AJAX application-building development tool that will help me build browser applications with a drag-and-drop interface?
Determining Microsoft Jet Database Engine vulnerability
05/14/08
Do we need to worry about the recently disclosed vulnerability in the Microsoft Jet Database Engine if we have Windows XP Service Pack 3 installed?
Freeware lets you make Windows screen-cast movies
05/07/08
Can you recommend a low-cost or open source screen-capture program that will let me make screen-cast movies of what happens on my Windows computer screen?
Getting baseline records established with Tripwire 7
04/29/08
We installed Tripwire 7 and have deployed the software agents to the systems we want to monitor, but are having trouble getting our baseline records established. We created nodes for each of our Windows servers and set up the Active Directory monitoring rules we want the system to use for monitoring directory service operations. For some reason the baseline operation runs very briefly and does not create a baseline record or provide any error messages to guide our troubleshooting. Any ideas?
SFTP clients for Windows and Macs
04/22/08
Our server administrators have disabled FTP and now only provide support for SFTP connections for file transfer. Where can we find a graphical SFTP client for Mac OSX? Is there an SFTP client product that supports Windows and Macs?
Seeking IDE tools
04/16/08
I inherited a development project in which the work has been done with the Minimal GNU for Windows (MinGW) tools and I am looking for an integrated development environment (IDE) that can pull everything together for us. Eventually we need to be able to deliver the product for Linux and possibly Macintosh platforms as well as for Windows. Are there any IDE tools for MinGW you would recommend?
An answer for wireless connection woes
04/09/08
We're trying to connect a Pentium III computer running Windows 2000 to a wireless network using a USB wireless network adapter. The Linksys wireless router is set up to use WEP security and the USB adapter connection manager shows that we have a connection with excellent signal strength, but we still cannot get the PC connected to the Internet wirelessly. We followed the Linksys installation instructions. We've tried both DHCP on the PC and setting a fixed IP address and still nothing. There are not any other wireless computers hooked up yet, but wired connections are working fine. Any ideas about how to get the wireless going?
Knoppix solves NTFS partition woes
04/01/08
Is it possible to write to an NTFS partition after booting a PC with a Linux boot disk? I have a PC with a corrupt ntldr file on the C: drive that won't boot into Windows. I started the machine with Knoppix Linux disk and I can read the partition but I can't replace the file. Is there another utility that will allow writing to the NTFS partition?
How to fix problems with Apple's Boot Camp
03/25/08
I am having difficulties with my Macbook. I installed Leopard and I purchased Windows XP Home, but during the install process Boot Camp started sending an error message. I am stuck in a screen that asks for the boot disk. On the first screen of the install, there is a choice to print out the instructions for installing Windows XP, and that is when the first error message is given that Boot Camp wasn't working. I was able to start the install over, but after doing part of the install, the disk is not ejected and the error message comes up as "disk error, press any key to restart" which doesn't work when I press any key.
Google Apps makes it easy to build Web-based collaboration environment
03/18/08
I need to provide a Web-based collaboration environment for a distributed group of customers who are working to produce documentation together. People from multiple organizations need to be able to access a shared Web site that allows them to share documents and hold online discussions regarding the content. Is there a low-effort, high-quality service out there that would save us from having to build this or host it ourselves?
Double check your system clocks for daylight-saving time
03/11/08
It is daylight-saving time again. Do we need to worry about unpatched systems not tracking the correct time this time around?
Converting audio files to text is getting easier
03/04/08
We have a large number of audio files we need to make transcripts from. Are there any affordable, automatic-transcription software tools available or are we stuck using human transcriptionists?
FindBugs analyzes Java code
02/26/08
FindBugs is a nice static analyzer that can identify a variety of bugs and potential bugs in Java code. Version 1.3.2 was released earlier this month and can be downloaded and installed locally or it can be launched via Java Web Start from the FindBugs page on sourceforge.net. The program can analyze class files and/or source files.
Getting to know Google Android
02/20/08
I've been hearing about the Google Android platform for mobile phones and I'd like to know more about how and where to get a phone that uses Android. Also, I'd like information about how to explore developing applications that can talk to our services from an Android phone.
Tasktop can track your to-do list
02/12/08
I need help tracking my work-week to-do list. I've tried a number of approaches and tools but haven't found anything that really ties my project items, e-mail and calendar(s) together. Can you recommend something that does?
Choosing a rootkit scanner
02/05/08
We're worried that one or more of our PCs are infected with malware, perhaps rootkits. We have scanned and cleaned with the latest antivirus definitions, and the machines are still running slow and behaving strangely. What kinds of rootkit scanners are available?
Checking to see if SMTP server is legitimate for a domain
01/31/08
Is there a mechanism in place to authenticate an SMTP server as an authorized or legitimate sender of e-mail for a domain?
Apache2 improvements worth the trouble of updating configuration files in Leopard
01/22/08
My Web site stopped working after I upgraded my Mac to Leopard. Instead of my Web page, I get a Forbidden error that says I don’t have permission to access the site. The folder is "world readable" and it worked just fine before the upgrade. Web sharing is turned on. How do I fix this?
PowerPoint prints poster documents right
01/15/08
We recently installed a large-format poster printer but it didn't come with any large-format layout software. The printer drivers work OK, but we keep ending up with letter-sized printouts centered on three-foot paper. What can we use to print poster-sized poster documents?
Building presentations for any standard browser
01/08/08
We built some multimedia presentations with Microsoft Producer after reading your column about it in August and are now looking for a similar presentation builder that will publish files that can be viewed with browsers other than Internet Explorer. Have you found any programs that work similarly but publish to formats that Firefox and Macintosh users can view?
New QuickTime version addresses RTSP problem
12/18/07
What can we do to overcome the recent Realtime Streaming Protocol (RTSP) problem in QuickTime? We rely on an external training resource that uses a variety of QuickTime media distributed through a content distribution network, and we’re concerned that our workstations are vulnerable through this QuickTime vulnerability.
Fine tuning Eclipse to work with Leopard
12/11/07
We've been using Eclipse to build multiplatform applications but things are broken on the Mac now that Apple has released Leopard and people are upgrading from Tiger. What changes are required in an Eclipse Rich Client Platform (RCP) application to get it working correctly again on both Tiger and Leopard?
Running Eclipse from a CD or flash drive
12/04/07
You can run Eclipse from a CD or a flash drive without too much trouble.
Submerge merges titles into QuickTime movies
11/27/07
I have a training video done in Quicktime and a text transcript that I need to include so the video has subtitles to match the audio. I could do it by hand with Final Cut but that seems tedious. Is there a way to merge these automatically?

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