What You Need to Know about All Things PC
Volume 2 Number 26Click here to return to the back issues page.Click here to return to the main newsletter page.
The Naked PC - http://www.TheNakedPC.com What You Need to Know about All Things PC Publisher: Lee Hudspeth and T.J. Lee Editor in Chief: Dan Butler Contributing Editor: Al Gordon This issue is for Thursday, December 23, 1999 - Vol. 2 No. 26 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Table of Contents ** 01. Letter from the Publisher ** 02. The TNPC Newsletter Web Site ** 03. Articles on Demand ** 04. TNPC and the Old Profit Motive ** 05. What's This FREE Stuff All About? ** 06. Books in Review ** 07. A Serious Reminder About Viruses ** 08. From All of Us at TNPC to All Our Readers ** 01. Letter from the Publisher Welcome to the last issue of TNPC to be sent out THIS MILLENNIUM! Whoa! Before you hit that reply button we're only kidding. We know that the millennium is not "really" over until 12/31/2000 because there was no year zero. But the zero hour for Y2K will hit before you get another TNPC and experts are predicting all sorts of horrific and calamitous "end of the world as we know it" scenarios so who's to say. I mean, it's possible that airline computers will start charging everyone on a given airplane the same fare, spreadsheets used by government contractors will start charging Uncle Sam the same amount for toilets as Home Depot, political polls might actually reflect what the average thinking person thinks, and all will be higgledy-piggledy in the world. Speaking of Y2K, take a look at a fully Y2K-compliant version of Office 2000 (it requires no electricity, is impervious to EMF bursts, and you can take it with you into your Y2K bunker): http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?office2000 Y2K issues aside, it's the holiday season around the world. This week in the USA, business pretty much shuts down as most of our American readers will try to stretch reading their email and cleaning off their desks from Monday till early Wednesday when they'll split from the office for a long weekend. So to help them in their efforts we thought that for this issue of TNPC we'd do our end of year, 1999 in review, TNPC extravaganza! We thought we'd do this because we've never really done one, and because we've been averaging about 1,000 new subscribers per issue. Volume 1 Issue 1 went out to 267 subscribers and here 18 months later our most recent issue, Volume 2 Issue 25, went out to 42,671. That's an astounding growth rate. Some perspective on TNPC might be of interest to our more recent subscribers. Read on... As always, reader support is what keeps TNPC free, so please pass a copy of TNPC on to co-workers and friends (no spam please!) and always say "I saw it in TNPC!" +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ Browse, View, Zip, Search, FTP & Backup... all at the same time? Work with file selections across multiple directories? Chances are you're still stuck with the same file management software that came with your operating system - time to upgrade! FileProbe redefines the concept of file management software. Find out why - further information and a free 30-day trial version available from http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?sponsor1 +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ ** 02. The TNPC Newsletter Web Site During 1998 we responded to the requests and threats by removing the truly awful black background from the TNPC site thereby rendering the links visible to many visitors for the first time. We're really sorry for that background but gosh darn it, we thought it looked stark and very cool. Now, the first rule of Web design clearly states, "forget cool, go for readable content," which goes to show you that even when you know what you're doing you can still make silly mistakes. Moving right along to 1999 we got serious and responded to the requests of many of our readers and made the TNPC Web site more than just a handy place to come to subscribe to the newsletter. Back issues have always been available for viewing on the site but it was difficult and tedious to find a particular article. TNPC's Editor in Chief, Dan Butler, reworked the site and we started breaking out each article into its own HTML page. In addition, he created an index of all the articles and added a search script so you can search for key words in the article database. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/articles/index.html Of course you can also search the entire text of all the back issues since TNPC Volume 1 Issue 1: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/cgi-bin/htsearch The Naked Horde page changed this year as well. Amok Shing now provides a number of small graphics that TNPCers can use for links they create from their pages to the TNPC site. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/horde.html We also added a "Letters to the Editor" page. TNPC readers are opinionated and oft times make very good points when commenting on things in TNPC or on problems and experiences they've had with their computers. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/letters/index.html We still get a number of emails requesting back issues of TNPC. We've automated this process with the TNPC Mailbot. Simply send the TNPC Mailbot a message and he'll reply with instructions on how to get any prior issue of TNPC sent right to your inbox. mailto:mailbot@TheNakedPC.com If you've not visited the TNPC Web site in a while you might want to stop by and see how things have changed. Comments are welcome. http://www.TheNakedPC.com ** 03. Volume 2 Articles on Demand In 1999 we started putting individual articles from each issue of TNPC up on our Web site. This was in direct response to TNPCers requesting that we provide a more searchable way to find and view TNPC content on the Web without having to wade through all the back issues one by one. The response has been an overwhelming increase in Web site traffic. Over 80,000 separate IP addresses visited the TNPC site this year alone (with nearly two weeks left in 1999 to go). This has allowed us to somewhat gauge the popularity of a given article by (1) the email response we get and (2) the number of "hits" an article gets after posting to the Web site. Among the more popular articles have been those on sharing your Internet connection among several computers, the trials and tribulations of getting DSL connection working, the excellent System Warts and Low Tech Solutions series, and the Software Bargains series that has evolved into a regular feature in TNPC. We've also noted that TNPCers are very interested in articles about Linux and Al Gordon's pieces on WinNT (soon to be Windows 2000) so you'll see more on alternate operating systems in future issues. We also noticed that the in-depth reviews of hardware and software were very popular and so we've been working hard to give you more of these as noted by our recent reviews of rewritable CD-ROM drives and CD-ROM software. Look for more of these types of in-depth reviews in upcoming issues. Check out the available articles on the TNPC Web site: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/articles/index.html TNPC Contributors include (in alphabetical order): Peter G. Barnett (Symantec) Dan Butler (Editor in Chief) Charlotte Foust Al Gordon (Contributing Editor) Lee Hudspeth (Publisher) James Kinard T.J. Lee (Publisher) James Manka Rebecca Rachmany (TECH-TAV Documentation Ltd.) Matthew Smith (Amalgamated Binaries) Find out more about our contributors on the crew page: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/tnpc_crew.html Hopefully, in the weeks to come we'll get the articles from Volume 1 of TNPC translated to HTML and posted to the TNPC Web site. That way our current readers can read about Jim's low cost washable wrist rest and what to do with the ever increasing number of spurious CD-ROMs that we all have gathering dust in the back of our desk drawers. Oldies but goodies all. +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ >> WEB 4 LIFE for TNPC readers - $30 Rebate >>OWN Your Internet Access & get 5 E-Mail!! FREE Net Nanny Filtering Software to Protect Kids!!! >>$30 REBATE!!! Click Now and Order on our Site: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?sponsor2 Lifetime Internet Access is the BEST GIFT 1-888-267-1122 +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ ** 04. TNPC and the Old Profit Motive Let's try to (once more) clear up the issue of the links we provide in the newsletter that make it easy for readers to find and acquire items we've featured. These links usually lead to either Amazon.com (for books) or Beyond.com (for products). The fast shuffle we are sometimes accused of is of trying to make a profit by being members of Amazon's and Beyond's affiliate programs. Where our accusers are wrong is that we make no bones about it! You bet we're Amazon and Beyond affiliates. If you buy something through TNPC we do our darndest to make an honest farthing on the transaction. As we have stated, in print, on our Library page since day one: "...these small remunerations help us defray the not insubstantial costs of publishing TNPC free. We don't recommend books we don't own, have read, and use in our daily consulting jobs. These books are those we consider good value and that contain useful information. No kidding. So when you buy a TNPC featured book, you help yourself and you help us too." The same applies to products we recommend. Many are shareware or freeware, but all are products we use ourselves and/or believe offer excellent value. Indeed, many of these recommended products or products mentioned in our Software Bargains articles, or in our HotTips section on our Web site, are FREE. Where possible, we provide a link to Beyond.com to facilitate a TNPC reader in finding and purchasing that product. In the last year and a half we've only had one reader complain about the service on Beyond.com's site. We find Beyond.com, like Amazon.com, to be reputable and we have no qualms recommending that folks make purchases through them. Could you find the same item cheaper somewhere else on the Internet? Possibly, and every TNPC reader is free to do so. We offer the links as a convenience and as a way to try to make a small commission and defray our production costs. We also sell advertising in TNPC. Barring ads that are suspect in their legality or in obvious bad taste, we pretty much operate on the principle, "If you can get your check or credit card on the counter you can place an ad in TNPC." http://www.TheNakedPC.com/tnpcadvertising.html We don't make enough to pay for anyone's time spent on the newsletter but we usually make up our hard costs of sending the newsletter out to 43,000+ subscribers. +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ The Unofficial Guide to PCs "It's packed full of important knowledge and valuable tips that you can use to take full control of your computer." This is what readers have said about "The Unofficial Guide to PCs" from QUE. >From hardware to software this book has all the critical information you need to optimally maintain your personal computer. "I am just writing to tell you that last week I bought your book and three days later I finished it. It is without a doubt the best book I have read on computers ever." -- Andrew H. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon4-us http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon4-uk +++------------------------- sponsor -------------------------+++ ** 05. What's This FREE Stuff All About? More than one email has come in over the ether-transom reminding us there's no such thing as a free lunch and that there must be some kind of catch when we recommend a bargain as FREE. Sometimes things are FREE because they are freeware. The author of the item has decided to give it away for free. A lot of the free bargains we recommend are free but only AFTER REBATE. Ah-HA! Not really free then, you say? We beg to differ. The way these free-after-rebate deals on Beyond.com work is: first you have to purchase the item on the Beyond.com site with a credit card. As far as that goes it is a sales transaction whereby your credit card is indeed charged. Then you apply for a manufacturer's rebate (and sometimes a second rebate offered by Beyond.com), which totals to the amount charged to your credit card. The net cost is therefore zero, zip, nada, nothing. To us that means free. The only real catch is that most of these offers are limited to purchasers in the United States and Canada. We've asked Beyond.com about this but so far have not gotten what we'd call a substantive response. We're always looking for similar bargains available to our overseas readers but have not come up with anything yet. We've also been considering including Amazon links for recommended books to Amazon UK and other non-USA Amazon sites. If this idea appeals to you let us know. As always, if you know of other software or hardware bargains that would interest TNPC readers, send them to: mailto:bargains@TheNakedPC.com ** 06. Volume 2 Books in Review We try to feature a book in every issue of TNPC. As mentioned earlier these are books we (Jim, Lee, Al, Dan, or one of our contributors) have read ourselves and think well enough of to recommend it to you, our readership. And that goes to the heart of what TNPC is all about... the good neighbor who's also a computer consultant and who shares their experience with you. We occasionally omit a book feature from an issue because we get busy just like everyone else and may fall behind in our reading. We're also limited by having to recommend computer or business related books (which is a good thing or all we'd hear about is Jim's BattleTech novels that he's always going on about). (As the next year unfolds, we may make exceptions and occasionally feature non-computer books.) Your response to the titles we've recommended over the past year and a half has been very positive. We often hear some weeks after recommending a book from a TNPCer who took our advice telling us what they got out of it. The most popular titles that have generated the most positive emails are these (in no particular order): The Visual Display of Quantitative Information by Edward R. Tufte One of the things we said about this book in our review was, "If you create charts or graphs in Excel, or any graphics or charting software whatsoever, or even if you draw pie charts on cave walls, GET THIS BOOK!" Apparently from the email we received a great many of you did and were as pleased with this definitive work on charting as we were. This book was featured in Volume 1 Issue 2, only the second book featured in TNPC and we still get email praising it. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon1-us How to Read a Book by Mortimer Adler and Charles Van Doren A recent recommendation (Volume 2 Issue 25), we answered the rhetorical question about how good a book with this title could be. "It can prove to be one of the more useful books you've ever read." That's a fact as this book tells you how to glean the meat and potatoes, the very heart, the core sustenance of the material to be found in any book. We recommended this title to anyone who has to read books in the course of their studies or job and an awful lot of TNPCers took our recommendation to heart. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon2-us http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon2-uk Poor Richard's Web Site by Peter Kent Back in Volume 1 Issue 9 we said, "If you've ever wanted to build your own Web page but didn't have a clue about how to begin, or how to do it on a shoestring budget, you need to get this book." A very large number of you did indeed want to build your own Web page and agreed with us that Peter Kent could show them how to do it for next to nothing. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon3-us http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon3-uk The Unofficial Guide to PCs by T.J. Lee, Lee Hudspeth, and Dan Butler This is our very own book and we flog it unmercifully in TNPC because we can. Oh, and because we think it's a great book for computer users to have. From the comments and reviews we've gotten back, a number of you agree and sales to TNPCers have been very satisfying. This book has something for everyone from the beginner to the old hand who finds they've overlooked a few tricks. Note that TUGPCs has gone into a second printing to keep up with demand. Of course if we'd only had the foresight to work "Pokemon" into the title we'd be sitting on an beach in Tahiti right now, ah well, you can't have everything. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon4-us http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon4-uk These were the top four books as measured by sales and feedback from our readers. We've recommended 34 titles to date. You can check them all out on our Library page where we've listed each book and its review. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/tnpcbooks.html Oh, the least popular book? Well, it was a surprise to us but the least favorite book recommended by someone at TNPC (not that we'd tell who, right Jim?) was "The Dilbert Principle" by Scott Adams. No idea why, but Dilbert took backseat to even some of the hardcore programming books we've touted over the last 18 months. http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon5-us http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?amazon5-uk ** 07. A Serious Reminder About Viruses and Backups As another year closes and Y2K grabs more headlines, please make sure that your virus scanner has the most up to date virus definitions. Reports are already surfacing about new viruses set to trigger on December 25, 1999 or January 1, 2000. Make sure your data is safe from viruses and that your backup is current. Avoiding a virus is simple but not always easy. Some simple rules to remember: * Don't open an attachment from anyone unless you scan it for viruses first. * Don't open any files off a floppy disk until you've scanned the disk. Dan found a virus just the other day on a floppy he hadn't used in years. * Do scan your files before you send them to friends, just as an added precaution. * Don't forward all the chain letters you receive this season to 300 of your closest friends. Okay so this doesn't pertain to viruses really but NOT forwarding these messages is courteous and does help cut down on the time we all spend at the computer. If you have to forward something, at least delete the extra 200 or so email addresses that have accumulated in the message before you got it. Make sure your system is clean and then backup your most important data. We cover both of these topics in some detail in our book "The Unofficial Guide to PCs." If you don't currently have a virus scanner, grab McAfee VirusScan 4.0 for free from Beyond.com: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/t/226/tr.cgi?beyond1 ** 08. From All of Us at TNPC to All Our Readers We'd like to thank each and every one of our readers for subscribing to TNPC and wish you all a very happy holiday season. May the New Year find you fully Y2K compliant. You can reach T.J. Lee at: mailto:tj_lee@TheNakedPC.com You can reach Lee Hudspeth at: mailto:leehudspeth@TheNakedPC.com You can reach Dan Butler at: mailto:danbutler@TheNakedPC.com You can reach Al Gordon at: mailto:algordon@TheNakedPC.com +++-----------------------------------------------------------+++ WANT TO GET YOUR WORD OUT? Classified ads in The Naked PC can be yours for the ridiculously low price of $40 per issue. 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The Naked PC is not responsible for the manner in which the information presented is used or interpreted. Also, although we work hard to provide you with accurate Internet links in The Naked PC, we are not responsible for Internet links herein that represent sites owned and operated by third parties. We are not responsible for the content, accuracy, performance, or availability of any such third-party sites. Grass stains may not wash out. Do not fold, spindle, or mutilate because it sounds like that would really hurt and we're not sure what spindle means anyways. REDISTRIBUTION POLICY We encourage you to forward this newsletter to your friends, associates, and colleagues for their review and enjoyment. However, please do so only by sending it in full, thereby keeping the copyright and subscription information intact. We do request that, once they've reviewed an issue or two, they subscribe independently rather than continue to receive issues from you. This helps TNPC grow and prosper, thereby funding its continued publication. Also, if you wish to post this newsletter to a newsgroup or electronic discussion group, you may do so if you preserve the copyright and subscription information. Thanks. SUBSCRIPTION SERVICES To subscribe or unsubscribe, surf on over to: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/subscribe.html To make comments or suggestions, surf on over to: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/tnpfeedback.html or send email directly to: mailto:tnpc@TheNakedPC.com Get back issues form our Mailbot by sending email to: mailto:Mailbot@TheNakedPC.com WEB BULLETIN BOARD Check out our 24x7 Web bulletin board. If you've got a technical question about PC issues, or suggestions of your own, this is the place to hang out: http://www.PRIMEConsulting.com/cgi-local/annoy.pl ADVERTISING To advertise in TNPC go to: http://www.TheNakedPC.com/tnpcadvertising.html Mail services provided by Blue Horizon Enterprises, one of the very few "Mom and Pop" operations left on the Web: http://www.bhorizon.com Copyright (c) 1999, PRIME Consulting Group, Inc. and Dan Butler. All Rights Reserved. The Naked PC is a trademark of PRIME Consulting Group, Inc. ISSN: 1522-4422 RMH: 564 TNPC Hot Tips:
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