The Management Consulting Group

Copyright 2006 Otis Cooper

Talk about one of life’s most annoying experiences,well almost.A computer with the “Blahs” makes anyone’s computing frustrating to say the least.

You’ll certainly want to learn and do all you can to both rid your computer of all that’s causing it to perform less than it should.

Removing certain software applications that start at bootup and continue to run during operation increases your system performance.

Before you perform software removal on your system, its always best to backup your hard drive or at least all files you consider critical.

To quickly relieve your computer of a very slow bootup process is to remove all those programs that run during startup that you most likely never use in the first place.

One way to slim down the programs that run during startup is by using such third party utilities such as Winpatrol at http://www.winpatrol.com. This utilty will show which program is running in Windows amd in Enternet Explorer.

Another way tois to go online and visit PC PitStop which have some awesome scan,registry,and other utilties.Some of these utilities are trial versions of third party software

But most utilties on this visit is free and should be a great help when it comes to improving performance. Visit now by going to http://www.pcpitstop.com

Dom’t want to spend money on third party software, no problem.Windows System Configuration is a free utility within Windows that can remove programs from your Registry,shortcuts to your start menu,and your autoexec.bat file.

To start this utility,click on Start,Run and type in the name “msconfig” in the open field.After clicking OKAY, the utility will launch.

To prevent a prgram from starting up,you clear the check box next to it,click OK,and you will have to reboot for the change to takd effect.

Windows has services that may be running at startup which will cause slow bootup time.You can save both time and memory by stopping these services if you don’t need them.

To open the services console,right click My Computer, and select Manage.When the management console opens,in the left pane double click Services And Applications.You can also click the plus sign next to it.This will expand the item and show the services.

The services listed as started are the ones that runs at startup.Automatic means that the services runs each time the system boots up.Manual means that the service may be started should Windows need that service.

Be certain to stop and take the time to carefully check the services running on your system.Disabling a service that windows need could cause problems however.

Go to www.find.pcworld.com/43694 to see a helpful list of Microsoft services along with detailed information to help you decide which service you can safely disable.

If you play games on your system you may consider turning off services that improve the performance of the computer.Turning off these services when not playing games should boot the system’s speed.

STOP THOSE TIME CONSUMING SERVICES

You can use download batch files that will turn these services off and on all at once.Such services as Windows Automatic Updates and Anti Virus utilitiy can be turned off and on when desired.

Stopservices.cmd is a batch file that turns your services off while Startservices will turn them back on again.Its that simple for you to give it a try to see if your computer’s performance is noticable.

You can download Stop and Startservices.cmd at the PC World site at www.pcworld.com and give each file a try.Note that rebooting your computer will also return the services back to their normal state.

You can customize each file by right-clicking the file and selecing the Edit menu command. To run the files, move them into your C:WindowsSystem32 folder, then click Start, Run, and type either stopservices or startservices, depending on what you want to do.

Keep in mind that it is time consuming when any computer boots no matter how much disabling and removing you do.Learning how to tweak your computer will help you learn that much more about your computer.

And more importantly,you can share this knowledge you gained with your friends and be known as an expert in the computer field.

Otis F. Cooper is solely dedicated to boosting the knowledge and confidence of every computer user. Use his informative articles and videos to understand all about the PC. Read more in depth articles for pc training and repair at www.repairarticles.com

Most small companies and home users don’t need to buy an expensive solution for data backup. They can simply copy important files to a CD or DVD, and if an information loss occurs, they can get it back easily.
If it is simply to copy documents, photos and other files, not the same is for emails, attachments, address book, stationery and other related information from your Outlook Express email client.
This article will explain how everybody can create a manual Outlook Express backup copy (because Outlook Express don’t offer a built in backup function) This email program is usually installed with the Windows operating system and is probably among the most commonly used email programs today.

1. Backup email messages
In Outlook Express, emails are stored in files with DBX extension. The easiest way to find these files is to open Outlook Express and from menu select Tools | Options | Maintenance and click the Store Folder button. Here you can find the path to the folder containing your emails.
This procedure works for all kind of email: SMTP / POP3, IMAP, MAPI, or even the Hotmail Account (some messages might be stored only at the Hotmail server).
To save all your emails and attachments you should copy all the DBX files from the folder.

2. Account settings:
Details about your mail and news accounts are stored in the registry. To find them, start RegEdit and select the “HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Account Manager” key from the left panel. To save this data, from menu select: Registry | Export Registry File. Save the file to a name like “accounts.reg”.

3. Mail Rules
The Outlook Express mail rules are stored in the registry, in the “HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Identities” key. To save this data, from menu select: Registry | Export Registry File. Save the file to a name like “rules.reg”.

4. Address Book
The backup of address book is easy to do. It is stored in files with WBA extension. To find the location where address book is stored, you should open Outlook Express and from menu select File | Export | Address Book and select the comma separated text file as your output format. Click Export, select the folder where the backup will be saved and set the name for the backup file. After that click Next and choose the fields you want to include in your backup. Click Finish and your backup will be ready.

5. Stationery
The Outlook Express stationery location is stored in a registry key. To find it, you should open RegEdit, find “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Shared Tools\Stationery” key and look at “Stationery Folder” value. There you will find the path to stationery folder. To save the stationery, you should copy all files from that folder.

If you think that manual backup is too hard, you can use a backup software tool, which can make the job much easier. Outlook Express Backup Expert is one product that can be used to easily create Outlook Express backups. It can save your emails, attachments, address book, signatures, blocked list, mail rules, stationery, accounts and settings. The biggest advantage to use automatic email backup software is the schedule function, which will create backups at specified time intervals, without user action. The downside of using a automatic email backup utility is that it costs money, usually about 20-30 USD as one time payment, while the manual backups are of course, free.
The conclusion is that email backup is a critical operation for every user.

A free evaluation copy of Outlook Express Backup Expert can be found at: http://www.bodrag.com/outlook-express-backup.html

Dragos is the webmaster of the BODRAG website: www.bodrag.com/outlook-express-backup.html

The market for all those one time high paying computer programming jobs are starting to be filled be less expensive offshore software developers. Welcome to the world of global competition in offshore software development. Depending on your context, offshore software development can be viewed as a new competition threat or opportunity in new resources. Or, it can be viewed as a combination of both.

As an American, I believe there is mostly a negative conatation towards the trend of large American companies offshoring jobs. You know, the underlying tone is somthing similar to “big companies only care about profits, not people”. Honestly, when the topic is big business, I can agree with points on both sides of the discussions. But, what is often lost in these discussions of offshoring software development jobs are the opportunities it creates for small business.

I’m living proof that small business opportunity lies in being able to win local clients and then clearly articulate and manage the project to offshore developers. For me, more time needs to be spent thinking on strategic level concepts and ideas rather than fulfilling tactical level operations. I did not realize this overnight and it has taken me years to accept.

As a software developer, my industry is in a state of flux. Is offshoring software development a good thing or a bad thing? The jury is still out and the discussions are usually quite lively. Over the years, I’ve heard the following snippets in the discussions “quality vs. cost”, “you get what you pay for”, “we tried offshoring software development once and now we spend all day fixing offshore developers code”, “we saved a boatload of money by offshoring certain tactical aspects of software development”, etc. In my experience, these points have more merit in big company circumstances compared to small business.

Clients for website development expect to pay lower fees than they did in the 90s regardless of their company size. As a small business owner, I’m unable to maintain a sustainable profit margin with lower client fees. What can I do? Simple. Hire offshore developers at lower rates, so my profit margin allows the projects to be worthwhile. The opportunity for me is to spend more time on clearly defining technical architecture, project management and communicating regularly with developers and clients rather than writing code.

Win-win-win: Client wins, my company wins, offshore software developers win. But, when there is a winner, there usually is a looser? The looser in software development landscape shift is the small business that refuses to adapt to global competition or utilize these global resources. Or the individual software developer who refuse to adapt to lower rates and more pressure and competition to innovate. And no, building walls around ourselves and the industry is not the answer. If we try create global software development competition barriers, we are creating a path towards lose-lose-lose.

Todd McGrath is web developer, manager and entrepreneur who is facing the shift of software development landscape.

More content and resources: Community resources for offshore and outsource software development

Working in an office all day, connected to an open network I need to be very protective of my computer. I don’t look at those sites I shouldn’t be looking at, I don’t download music, and I have an adware and virus protection plan I stick to religiously. Each Monday upon startup, while I’m downloading my weekend mail and listening to the weekend dramas of my collegues I update my virus definitions and proceed to scan every inch of my computer for invading viruses.

If I’ve made it through the working week I deserve a treat, so I drag my best friend out of her office and off we go to this quaint sushi bar down the street. Fire, dancing and fantastic sushi made in front of my eyes is just enough to make me forget the work piling up back at the office.

Anyway by the time I pulled myself out of sushi mode, up the stairs, and back to the office my weekly spyware scan was complete, and was congratulating me on having a “spyware and adware free computer.”

Working on the net all day every day, competent adware protection software is important. I’m always skeptical when collegues offer me a new, free adware software. So for the last 2 months I’ve been using not just one adware protection program, but the 2 best anti-adware software packages I could find…….. everything was going great until……….

It was Friday morning, just one more day till the weekend, the boss couldn’t keep quiet about this weekends’ date, blonde, funny, the complete package…………..

Anyway, I was listening with amusement to the excited rantings while my inbox filled with this mornings messages, and suddenly everything went blue……. Not just my screen, but everyone on the network……….. Everything was down, no work today………………

Monday morning came around and the boss wasn’t happy, he missed his date trying to sort out the network, no date and no second chance……..

I was in the bad books, turns out one of the “Adware Protection” software programs I had downloaded had secretly filled mine, and every computer on the network with spyware….. Not Good At All!

A weekend without sales, without a date, and more than enough stress, all because of my one mistake…….. Needless to say I am no longer in charge of spyware and adware protection at the office. The techies who had to spend the weekend fixing my mistake have now installed a new adware program on my computer, one program to take care of the lot, I don’t touch it, I don’t change any settings, and I’m happy with that…..

Finally the boss has calmed down and everything’s under control again, luckily I’ve got a great boss that can see the funny side of things ……. and I still have a job! A lesson learned is the way I’m looking at the whole situation.

My advice to anyone working online is be aware of what you are downloading to your computer, sometimes software that should be protecting is actually infecting!

You can find the Adware Protecter we now use at http://www.realtimesolutions.info

While most of you have most likely thought after sometime IE6 was just old, clunky, out of date you will be glad that Internet Explorer 7 is arriving. Why you may ask? Well I can answer that one. Below are a list of newly introduced features / security enhancements to be made in IE7.

Internet Explorer 7’s new features:

RSS Reader - Stay up to date on the most important sites you visit with the new RSS Reader. Keep in touch with new forum post or breaking news right within Internet Explorer.

Anti-Phishing Filter - Have you been a victim of Identity Theft? Internet Explorer 7 now protects you from Phishing (Identity Theft) by blocking known sites to steal your identity. You can report sites as well to be blocked by the Anti-Phishing filter.

Improved Security - With Internet Explorer 7 ActiveX Controls are disabled by default that were not used in Internet Explorer 6. With this Internet Explorer 7’s security is very much improved.

Tab Browsing - Another welcomed feature that currently is in with Firefox web browser.

Improved Standards Support - Another lacking feature of Internet Explorer 6 is standards support. With the birth of Internet Explorer 7 you have now a much better browser with the very much needed standards support.

Windows Vista IE Security = Just WOW

With the release of Windows Vista due by early 2007 the improved security with Windows Vista and Internet Explorer 7 both combined make a wonder product upgrade. Internet Explorer 7’s protected mode is built upon the user account protection features in Windows Vista. With this new security innovation Internet Explorer now runs with low system rights protecting stuff like things executing like Internet Explorer 6 has been known to do. This will cut the amount of unwanted spyware/adware/malware from even installing by itself simply by visiting a vulnerable website.

Overall Conclusion

Internet Explorer 7 is a much welcomed upgrade over any other previous version. Internet Explorer 7’s security will be as good or better then Mozilla Firefox. And the welcome of Tab Browsing will make users very organized as well. Internet Explorer 7 will for sure take some of the marketshare Firefox stole. Overall though Internet Explorer 7 is as well designed product from Microsoft.

I own a software company and run several sites including an Internet Explorer site, Myspace Layouts and designs site and an SEO Tools related site.

Imagine something that follows you home and sets itself up
in your house. It eats your food, enjoys your drinks, reads
everything you bring home or purchase. It runs up your
phone bills and no matter where you go, it can follow you
and takes notes on everything you do.

Generically labeled spyware, your stealth visitor is a
program or set of programs designed to track your Internet
activity. And, while it hasn’t gone as far as above, it can
and will make your life uncomfortable.

The most benign form of spyware simply takes note of what
types of websites you visit and communicates the
information to its source. For advertisers, this adware
form of spyware allowed them to only send advertisements
you were likely to be interested in.

The theory being that it saved wasting anyone’s time on
products you wouldn’t likely care about or want to buy. Of
course, that was the theory. The practice has become one of
abuse, with so many packaged adware or spyware programs
downloaded, you may never know who is watching.

While there are different viruses that act spyware and
render malicious damage to your PC, bandwidth and sometimes
your modem, spyware may take the same format and render
similar damage.

Most spyware is installed after downloading some type of
free program or attachment from someone you don’t know.
Sophisticated processes can hide in .dll files and be
incredibly difficult to remove even for spyware zapper
programs.

The initial idea behind spyware or adware may not have been
so bad. However, they will take up lots of valuable CPU and
RAM space on your machine, clogging your Internet
bandwidth, which can create noticeable delays when you are
doing normal day-to-day activities. It can slow down reboot
processes because of adding unwanted programs to your start
up menu.

Those downfalls are just what happens with the programs not
designed to hijack your browser, point it at porn sites,
download pornographic material, steal your address books,
stored credit card information or create a waypoint for
hacking into other’s machines.

Spyware is a very real villain in the cyber world. The
majority of computer and Internet users do not believe
these types of programs affect them, yet more often than
not; they have hopefully been protected by firewalls and
anti-virus software that combat them.

Avoiding irresponsible net behavior, such as downloading
programs or files from an unknown sender, the taking of
free offers of packaged software, including games,
giveaways, software and utilities may prove detrimental to
the life and function of your machine. Many of these
packaged programs carry hidden within their walls spyware
of some type.

So whether it is designed to discover which web merchants
you visit most often or what credit card information you
have stored on your machine, spyware is a very real threat
in a world where the Internet is seemingly as important to
everyday activity as a pair of shoes. The best advice is to
be aware, in addition to installing anti-virus software
with firewall.

===========================================================

Discover all you ever wanted to know about spyware. Latest
discovery methods, latest incoculation treatments, latest
removal techniques. Click for useful info and daily
updated blog of spyware news and articles. Click http://www.spyware-revealed.com/

Tom Jenson has worked in software development for 20 years.
He’s seen spyware develop from an occasional problem, to a
daily, hourly threat to all pc’s. He made it a mission to
research these threats, and work out how best to combat
them. Now this series of article helps others protect
their computers too.

Most of the employers cutting across geographical boundaries go through the common - even though too an unwanted - process of hiring new employees, training and investing in them only to later find some such employees ditch them for another company(s) with, perhaps, better benefits and attractive incentives. Employees in America are switching jobs at a rate not seen in the past three years, according to the third quarter 2005 survey on the manpower statistics conducted by the American Institute of Human Resource Management.

A total of 240 companies participated in this survey, covering over 98,000 employees. The overall turnover rate in the third quarter of 2005 was 1.92%, higher than the second quarter and 8.64% higher when compared with the same period last year. The Information Tech. (14.7%) and Retail (12.5%) sectors recorded the highest turnovers.

What choices do an average employer really have? Go through the same painful ordeal of hiring new employees, training them only to later find such a thing take place once again! One solution to such a problem can be: Employee Leasing. There are two major kinds of Employee Leasing: Onshore and Offshore Employee Leasing. Onshore Employee Leasing company is a Professional Employment Organization (PEO). A PEO provides employees, and since these are the direct employees of Employee Leasing Company, a PEO saves the operating company the money that it otherwise may have to spend for creating an HR department for the purpose of hiring and managing employees. In order to provide financially conservative solutions and make profits, Onshore Employee Leasing Company often excludes or avoids hiring excellent salaried workers.

What’s Offshore Employee Leasing? Offshore Employee Leasing is nothing but a gradual development and smart progression of an old idea that has been in existence since the last few years. In a layman’s language, one can say that Offshore Employee Leasing is the hiring of new or additional work force from abroad at much cheaper rates, and, possibly on less obligatory and more accommodating and liberal terms.

Of all recruiting options and all professional employment organizations, the Offshore Employee Leasing is the best option of hiring employees, as it gives one the best value for one’s money at little or no obligations. Since the work force, by and large, are highly qualified and competent professionals from countries like India, and since they are often hired at cheaper rates, the hiring company stands to gain a lot from such an excellent system.

Stephen Seinfeld is a renowned expert on outsourcing and employee leasing, who writes extensively on these and related subjects for various websites and e-magazines.

Software Wants to Be Free…

…but users want it to be safe. Free software is everywhere, which makes it incredibly difficult these days to find the best of any particular kind. And then there’s the fact that “freeware” is not always free. Some freeware is just poorly written and may cause your computer to crash. Some are a conduit for spam and other system invasion techniques. Others are illegal copies of commercial software that can land you in legal trouble.

Nevertheless, there are several excellent software packages that are truly free, high quality, and useful. For general computer tasks and other fun stuff, here are some of my favorite sources:

First, circle the independent claims, which will illustrate here with parentheses, e.g., (1) means claim 1 is independent (it always is, BTW).

Second, use an arrow after a dependent claim to show what claim it is dependent from.

Third, use the PTO check mark and equal signs (from the file wrapper claim chart format) to indicate rejected or allowed claims. “=” means allowed, “./” (the closest can get to a check mark here) means rejected.

Fourth, draw the claim chart veritcally on the inside of the file wrapper (in the margin) – this way you get a road map of the claims during reviewing the case.

Miscellaneous notations might be added to remind you about the scope of the claims or other notes. e.g., “A” for apparatus, “M” for method, “o” for objected to, etc.

Example: A ten claim case with 3 independent claims might have a chart like this:

A (1) ./

2 -> 1 =

3 -> 1 ./

4 -> 3 =
M (5) =

6 -> 5 =

7 -> 6 =
A (8) ./

9 -> 8 o

10 -> 9 o

In day-to-day analysis of claims, people use the this type of claim tree as a way to visualize the analysis especially for complex claim structures.

For example, in an application with 100+ claims and an extended prosecution history (e.g., with many canceled, revised, and newly added claims), a visual depiction of the dependency structure of the claims (e.g. using a tree structure similar to Windows Explorer) can be invaluable. Some people take a further step of annotating the tree
structure to reflect the content of the claim and any references cited against the claim.

Another approach for making claim chart is a two-column table in every legitimate patent infringement analysis. In the left column are each and every limitation of the patented invention. In the right column is either a “yes” or “no” answer as to whether that limitation is present in the accused device or method. For example, an accused device and a claim chart are presented below:

Robert’s validity chart is not only useful for 102 analyses, but also 103 analyses, particularly the combining references type. Consider

Claim 1

Reference ‘A’

Reference ‘B’

A widget apparatus, comprising:

1) a frobosinator,

2) a pixilator, and

3) a green cogscreen

Widget apparatus:

Yes (col 1, line 10)

Yes (col 1, line 12)

No (but there is a blue cogscreen at col 7, line 10)

Widget subassembly

No.

No.

Yes (col 9, line 12)

This chart supports a rejection of claim 1 as obvious over ‘A’ in view of ‘B’.

The most useful automating tool that I have found is the shareware program that takes a draft specification and produces reports of the numbered items referred to in the claims and produces reports with respect to the same. It saves time in producing a Sec. 112 check.
For the most part, I have found analysis of claims not to be terribly difficult to do with human eyeball, but can see massive problems in trying to do them automatically, making it a project unsuitable for automation, because the cost/benefit ratio seems unfavorable. On the other hand, while this is certainly true for novelty searches, where you compare the claims of your application with the teachings of the prior art, where you pretty much ignore the claims, it may not be so true for a validity search, where you compare the claims of many patents with the accused device.

Vinod Kumar Singh

There are many variants of Linux used in different computer systems today. Luckily, most Linux developers employ a common naming and utilization scheme that makes different variants of Linux easy to use and maintain. This article will discuss some important and common directories in many popular Linux distributions.

/home
Each user of a Linux system is assigned a special directory, called “home” direectory, that represents their private space on the system. For example, if a user of the system is called tom, the home directory of tom will be /home/tom. Tom has the right to create any files and directories under his home directory. This is also the default location when tom logs into the system.

/root
This is the home directory of the adminstrator or super user.

/tmp
In addition to personal hard disk space in the home directories, users are also given special access to shared temporary space in the /tmp directory. Linux systems often implement quotas on user accounts to prevent anyone from using too much disk space. The /tmp directory allows all users access to additional space to meet short term needs without charging the space against their quota. All files placed in this directory are deleted automatically after a few days.

/etc
This directory stores all the configuration files needed for the operating system. For example, startup configuration scripts are found in /etc/rc.d and network configuration scripts are found in /etc/sysconfig. Normal users cannot modify the files in /etc.

/bin and /usr/bin
Most system commands are stored as binary files only in machine readable format. Commands appropriate for use by ordinary users are either placed in the /bin or /usr/bin directory. Core commands like rm, mv, ls, cd go into /bin while supplementary utilities like compilers, firefox browser and openoffice go into /usr/bin.

/sbin and /usr/sbin
Like /bin and /usr/bin, /sbin and /usr/sbin store commands to be used only by the super user, ie root user. These include commands for attaching and removing hardware, starting and stopping the system…etc.

/var
This directory stores all the frequently changed files in the system. For example, incoming, outgoing mails, system logs, websites, ftp file archives…etc. very

Conlcusion
There are only a few directories to know to really start using Linux. If you understand what the main directories are, then exploring the sub-direectories becomes much easier. If you are lost while navigating the directories, always use “cd /” to return back the the root, “cd ..” to go up one level or use “pwd” to find out where you are. Another command “which xxx” tells you where certain commands are located.

Bernard Peh is a great passioner of web technologies and one of the co-founders of Sitecritic.net Site Reviews. He works with experienced web designers and developers for more than 5 years, developing and designing commercial and non-commercial websites. During his free time, he does website reviews, freelance SEO and PHP work.