The widget has been removed, but Wayne Huang, co-founder and chief technology officer at security firm Armorize, claims in an August 14 blog post that more than a half million of these parked domains are infected. Network Solutions says this figure is "inaccurate" but hasn't yet estimated the impact of the infection.
Regardless of the final tally of infected sites, malware in being spread increasingly to people who simply open an infected page in their browser. Fortunately, there are simple ways to reduce the risk of infection when you surf the Web.
Keeping your software current is de rigueur
Perhaps the best defense is to use an up-to-date browser. The latest versions of Internet Explorer, Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera, and Safari provide plenty of built-in security features, including the ability to warn you automatically whenever an executable program attempts to download and run. In a post from last November, I compared the security approaches of these five browsers.
Firefox users benefit from the many free security add-ons for that browser. I described five Firefox privacy add-ons in a post from last month. And just last week I reviewed Zscaler's Search Engine Security extension for Firefox that helps prevent Google, Yahoo, and Bing from serving up malicious links in their search results.
In addition to a secure browser, you must also make sure you keep your firewall and antivirus software updated and active. Microsoft recently released the beta of a new version of its free Security Essentials program. One of the new features in the update is tighter integration with both Internet Explorer and Windows' built-in firewall.
It (almost) goes without saying that you must also keep Windows itself up-to-date. Because some Windows updates can cause their own problems, I choose the option to download but notify me before installing the updates. That way I can wait a day or two after the updates are released to monitor the Web for reports of update-related woes.
This post from July 2008 explains how to reset Windows Update to wait before applying patches, and another post from a few months later describes how to check your Windows Update history.
Still, there are some critical updates that warrant application as soon as they're available, although you can't always take Microsoft's word for which of its updates are indeed "critical." Once again, keep an eye on CNET and other tech-news sites for information about these must-have Windows patches--especially around the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month.
Two free programs stop Web malware in its tracks
Even with the most recent, fully patched and updated versions of your browser and security software, malware can still wheedle its way onto your PC. For an added level of protection while surfing, download and install a program that locks out all attempts to alter your system. The free Sandboxie and DropMyRights utilities take different approaches to PC lockdowns, but both are effective.
After you download and install Sandboxie, the program's control window displays the applications that will run in its controlled environment. Any system changes attempted while Sandboxie is activated are erased when you close the program and restart the PC.
The free Sandboxie utility lets you browse and otherwise use your PC without allowing any changes to your system's configuration.
(Credit: Sandboxie)The concept behind DropMyRights is simple: programs require administrator rights to install, so if you run your browser with a standard user account, there's no way for a malicious program to gain a toehold on your system. Because many everyday PC activities require an administrator account--such as applying software updates and running defraggers and other system utilities--running as a standard user full-time can be daunting.
DropMyRights addresses this problem by allowing you to run specific programs with only standard-account privileges. To do so, you create a shortcut to launch the program with limited rights. When you want to run the application with full administrator rights, just launch it the usual way.
Gizmo Richards provides more information on installing and using both Sandboxie and DropMyRights on his TechSupportAlert site. Gizmo's instructions for installing and using DropMyRights are particularly handy.
Consider these simple steps the computer equivalent of the proverbial ounce of prevention.
If you spend more than 2 hours a day peering at a computer display, you have at least a 50-50 chance of experiencing vision problems or other physical ailments related to your PC use. That's according to Dr. Wendy Strouse Watt, O.D., in her 2003 article Computer Vision Syndrome and Computer Glasses.
The advent of flat panels may have minimized the risk somewhat, but most office workers now spend more time each day at a computer than they did at the time of the study. In a series of articles on Computer Vision Syndrome, the American Optometric Association (AOA) highlights the extent of the problem.
The association quotes the results of a survey of optometrists that estimates 10 million "primary" eye examines occur annually in the U.S. due in large part to use of computer displays. The AOA reports that computer users are more likely to complain of vision-related problems than to experience wrist pain and other musculoskeletal maladies.
You'll find plenty more about the causes of computer-related eyestrain in those two articles, as well as in this comprehensive article on the eMedicine site. More important for most of us PC users is the advice the articles offer for treating and avoiding health problems resulting from long hours using a PC. Here's a quick summary of the best ways to prevent and overcome ailments caused by extended computer use.
Get the angle-of-vision right
The AOA recommends a viewing distance from 20 to 28 inches, depending on the size of the text and the limitations of the workstation. Equally important is the viewing angle: the top of the monitor should be slightly lower than eye level so the viewer is looking down at an angle of about 15 degrees. Tilt the monitor up 10 to 20 degrees from vertical.
The eMedicine article features a pop-up diagram that lets you determine the optimum viewing angle based on a mathematical equation. The information is clearly intended for eye-health professionals, but the diagram certainly is precise.
The eMedicine site explains how to determine the best viewing angle for a display based on a mathematical formula.
(Credit: eMedicine/Web MD) Adjust the lighting
More accurately, adjust the glare level. Dr. Watt's article recommends that office areas where PCs are used have half the level of lighting you would find in a standard office. The experts also suggest finding and eliminating the sources of glare, such as windows and light-colored walls near the PC.
One reason PC users are more sensitive to light is that their eyes are wide open more of the time. The articles cite studies indicating that people blink much less often when staring at a computer display. This also tends to dry out the eyes, which is why many eye professionals recommend avoiding low-humidity work environments.
One way to give your eyes a break is to look away from the computer to a point at least 20 feet away for at least 20 seconds. Repeat each hour. An alternative is to close your eyes at least once an hour for about 30 seconds. But then people might think you were praying. (I've worked in offices where a prayer was about all we had.)
Adjust the display's brightness and contrast
In a CNET TV video, Eric Franklin describes how to use the free DisplayMate software to adjust an LCD monitor. As Eric notes, the higher you set the monitor's brightness, the quicker your eyes will give out.
Increase the size of your text
The All About Vision site suggests a simple way to determine your ideal text size: find the smallest size font you can see on the monitor and multiply that size by three. Browsers offer various ways to adjust the type size of Web pages, such as by using the mouse scroll button. I described several browser-zoom techniques in a post from last January.
Don't neglect the rest of your workstation
Back in 2009 I described several resources that help you set up your workstation ergonomically. One great site that wasn't included in that post is Stanford University's "Keys to safe computer use," which covers everything from keyboard shortcuts to reduce mouse use, to techniques for determining the correct height of your seat. The site includes a downloadable ergonomics PDF you can print as a trifold brochure that describes stretches you can do while seated.
Take breaks--lots of breaks
Rest breaks benefit more than just our eyes. Unfortunately, the demands of our jobs give us few opportunities in a workday to bust out of the cube farm. Most states require that employers offer their workers regular breaks during their shifts, and many organizations actively encourage their employees to take their allotment of rest periods each workday.
The fact is, many of us regularly work through our breaks--usually voluntarily. Just keep in mind that doing without work breaks can be hazardous to your health, in many different ways.
 |
FIND THE THINKPAD FOR YOU
High performance business laptops, thin and light laptops with long battery life.
Reliable and priced right. |
 |
Google Docs wouldn't open my test PPTX file, but the service lets you create and edit presentations in the older PowerPoint PPT format, albeit without most of the desktop app's formatting options. You won't find much in the way of transitions, effects, and other advanced features in Google Docs, either. The best feature of Google's online presentation tool is its clean interface, which isn't a surprise considering the company behind the service.
The no-frills interface of Google Docs' presentation app puts its limited features within easy reach.
(Credit: Google)Google Docs' presentation app lacks some of the extras found in Zoho Show, and it can't match the tight integration of Microsoft's PowerPoint Web App with its Office counterpart. But to create a quick-and-simple presentation with a handful of plain-vanilla slides, or for a light edit of an existing presentation, Google Docs is the only presentation software you need.
Despite the Office "ribbonette," more similarities than differences
While Google Docs' presentation app puts its formatting and other options on a conventional menu, PowerPoint Web App uses a modified version of the Office 2007/2010 ribbon. The View and Insert ribbons have only a handful of settings; the Home ribbon houses the formatting options, so it functions much like a toolbar. The Picture Tools ribbon appears when you select an image, but it offers just eight picture-format options.
The Home ribbon in Microsoft's PowerPoint Web App holds the service's formatting options.
(Credit: Microsoft)PowerPoint Web App includes many more font choices than the Google Docs presentation app, but both services let you add notes to your presentations, share them with others, and add, remove, or duplicate slides. Google Docs makes it easy to import slides from your desktop; I could find no easy way to do so in PowerPoint Web App.
PowerPoint 2010 lets you broadcast your presentation
It's one thing to share a presentation via e-mail link or attachment, but it's quite another to invite viewers to a live broadcast of your presentation. PowerPoint 2010 lets you do just that, in conjunction with a separate telephone connection so viewers can hear your narration.
In PowerPoint 2010, click File > Save & Send > Broadcast Slide Show > Broadcast Slide Show (a second time). In the Broadcast Slide Show dialog, click Start Broadcast. PowerPoint automatically connects you to a broadcast service and generates a link you can send to recipients via e-mail.
Once the audience has opened the link, click Start Slide Show to open the slide show viewer. The presentation proceeds at your speed. Press Esc to return to PowerPoint, where you can end the broadcast, resume it from the current slide, or restart it.
PowerPoint 2010 lets you broadcast a presentation that your audience views in a browser.
(Credit: Microsoft)Despite the need to establish a separate telephone link to the presentation viewers to allow them to hear your narration, there's no simpler, quicker way to get your slide show on the road. (The Microsoft Developer Network PowerPoint Team Blog describes many other broadcast options, including a short video demo.)
Microsoft's first true browser-based versions of the venerable Word, Excel, and PowerPoint applications won't make you abandon the programs' full-featured counterparts installed your hard drive. But if you splurge for Office 2010, you may find yourself spending a lot more time working in your browser.
You probably already do some word processing and spreadsheet work using Google Docs, Zoho, or another such service. (I described the Web's best desktop-app replacements in a post last month.)
These services have offered first-rate word processing and spreadsheet programs that run in a browser and let you create, open, and store files compatible with Word, Excel, and other programs. The services can't match the formatting, commenting, change-tracking, and other advanced features of Word and Excel, but they meet the word processing and spreadsheet needs of most casual PC users.
Microsoft Office Web Apps arrive
Accompanying the release of Office 2010 are versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote that run in your browser via Microsoft's Skydrive service (a Hotmail or other Windows Live account is required). I tested only the three older Web App components. I'm not familiar enough with OneNote to form an opinion.
I was most impressed with the Office PowerPoint Web App, which offers a surprising number of editing options. Still, I will likely have much more occasion to use Word Web App and Excel Web App. Both are eminently serviceable equivalents to their desktop counterparts, albeit with only a fraction of the features of Word and Excel. After switching between Google Docs and Office Web Apps for a week, I prefer the Google services, which offer more features in most categories and feel more familiar. Still, the Office Web Apps have a lot going for them.
Google Docs doesn't do presentations, so I compared PowerPoint Web App with the Zoho Show beta service, which is about as fast and full-featured as any free presentation service you'll find on the Web. You would expect the Microsoft product to be more compatible with the standalone version's features, but PowerPoint Web App also has a much more polished appearance and a surprising array of editing features.
Getting started with the real Office online
After you install Office 2010, you're prompted to visit the Welcome to Office 2010 site, where you'll find a link to sign up for the "Free Web Companions to Office."
Sign up for Microsoft's Office Web Apps via the "Welcome to Office 2010" site.
(Credit: Microsoft.com)Either sign in to an existing Windows Live account or create a free one. Then click the Office button on the main Windows Live menu to view the files in your SkyDrive online storage. Hover over a file name to activate options that let you edit the file in your browser, share it, download it, or see a version history.
Mouse over a file listed in your SkyDrive account to view options for editing, sharing, and downloading the file.
(Credit: skydrive.live.com)Opening a Word document in Word Web App shows an abbreviated version of the ribbon that debuted in most Office 2007 apps and returns in Office 2010. But rather than the standard complement of categories, Word Web App has a much more limited set of formatting options, although it does support several levels of headings among its two dozen-or-so styles.
The options in Office Word Web App are limited to standard formatting features and styles.
(Credit: Microsoft)I generally prefer the new Office ribbon to the old Office toolbars, but I found more of the word-processing features I needed on Google Docs than I did on Word Web App, including a greater number of insertion options and an easier-to-access spell checker. Likewise, the Google Docs spreadsheet may look old-fashioned next to the ribbon-bedecked Excel Web App, but Google's spreadsheet supports more formulas and other functions.
Google Docs' spreadsheet provides more formula options than Microsoft's Excel Web App.
(Credit: Google)It's clear Microsoft put a lot of work into the look of the browser versions of Word and Excel, but it's equally clear that the Web flavors of the cornerstone Office apps are shadows of their desktop equivalents. When you look at them for what they are instead of what they aren't, you find two well-designed, convenient, and very useful services, even with the ads that appear on most Windows Live screens (but not when you're working on your files, thank goodness).
The star of the Office Web Apps show is the PowerPoint Web App, which is particularly handy for making last-minute alterations to existing .ppt and .pptx files. Duplicating, deleting, and editing files is almost as natural as doing the same operations in the desktop version of PowerPoint. (As with the Word and Excel Web Apps, a link to open the current file in the app's Office 2010 desktop counterpart is placed prominently on the right side of the ribbon--when the Office 2010 app is available, that is.)
The PowerPoint Web App provides a range of editing and other touch-up tools to facilitate last-minute changes to presentations.
(Credit: Microsoft)As you would expect, transitions, timed playbacks, and other more-advanced features aren't available in the Web version of PowerPoint, although more effects played back when I opened files in the PowerPoint Web App than when I opened them in Zoho Show. (Zoho Show doesn't support the .pptx XML file format in the Office 2007 and 2010 versions of PowerPoint.)
Even with these limitations, I was impressed by the tools offered in Zoho Show for altering existing PowerPoint presentations and creating new ones. The service includes several options for sharing, publishing, and exporting presentations. You can duplicate, delete, and create slides, as well as insert various text boxes, images, and objects.
Zoho Show lets you create and edit PowerPoint presentations in your browser.
(Credit: Zoho)Microsoft's Office Web Apps are certainly not game-changers, but they demonstrate the growing sophistication of browser-based productivity applications. In their current state, they aren't likely to play a prominent role in organizations with any sizable number of PCs so as not to siphon customers from SharePoint and other server-based Microsoft properties. But they give Office 2010 a handy added feature that helps justify the program's expense--even with the flashy ads on most Windows Live pages.
But even then, Firefox and Chrome out-spell-check IE in a landslide.
The earlier post compared Firefox's built-in spell-check feature with the spelling checker in the free IE7Pro extension for Internet Explorer. It seems IE7Pro is no longer being supported by its developer, but several other IE add-ons offer to check the text you enter into Web pages. Perhaps the most popular of these is ieSpell from Red Egg Software.
The place I need as-I-type spell checking the most is in Gmail. Unfortunately, ieSpell doesn't check your Gmail messages as you type the way Firefox and Google Chrome do, nor does it let you right-click a misspelling to see suggested substitutes. The ieSpell option the program adds to IE's right-click menu checks the entire document, starting at the top.
Not even the Bing Toolbar (formerly the MSN Toolbar) offers a spell-check option. The only way I found to check my e-mail messages as I typed in IE was to use Hotmail. And since I forward the messages sent to my Gmail account to Hotmail, that's not a problem. (Google provides instructions for forwarding mail to and from Gmail on the service's Help site.)
Google Toolbar's modest upgrade to the Firefox spell checker
To enable Firefox's spell-check option, click Tools, Options, Advanced and select "Check my spelling as I type" under Browsing. The Google Toolbar for Firefox adds three options, the first two of which are checked by default: ignore all caps, ignore words with numbers in them, and ignore unrecognized words that appear repeatedly.
Firefox's all-or-nothing spell checker is enhanced with three settings in the Google Toolbar for Firefox spell-check feature.
(Credit: Google) Chrome extension adds more precise spelling and grammar checks
The spell checker in Google Chrome is on by default, and as far as I can tell, there's no easy way to disable it or adjust it. The new After the Deadline extension for Chrome not only highlights potential spelling and grammar errors, it also critiques your prose, hunting for passive voice, cliches, biased language, double negatives, jargon, and redundancies (I wonder if it also spots run-on sentences).
Multicolor lines appear under potential errors. Click the item to see suggested alternative spellings or the reason for the bad-grammar warning. The extension supports French, German, Spanish, and Portuguese in addition to English.
After the Deadline adds a grammar critique as well as a spell check to the text you enter in the Google Chrome browser.
(Credit: rsmudge)Sadly, After the Deadline doesn't work with Gmail. And while the AtD icon appears when composing a message in Hotmail, I wasn't able to run the spelling and grammar check in that webmail service, either. But when the extension works, it can be a shaky writer's best friend.
Two full-featured online spell checkers
Several sites offer to scan your text for spelling errors and suggest corrections on a paste-as-you-go basis. Two of the best of these are SpellChecker.net and Spelljax, although neither is as convenient as having your spelling checked on the fly.
|
FIND THE THINKPAD FOR YOU
High performance business laptops, thin and light laptops with long battery life.
Reliable and priced right. |
|
Some people don't mind strangers rummaging through their Facebook friends lists, wall posts, status updates, and other details of their online selves. The rest of us attempt to control who has access to our Facebook information. The recent revamp of the Facebook privacy settings makes it simpler to adjust the many settings that determine whether and how people contact you, and how much of your information they can access.
Two free online scanners put your Facebook privacy settings to the test, though they take very different approaches to how they generate their ratings. ReclaimPrivacy.org gives you a Facebook security grade in seconds without asking for any information or permissions. You have to install Connect in Private's Secure My Profile Facebook app and allow the program to access your information and settings.
Secure My Profile gives you more granular control over how and with whom you share your Facebook activities, but the program also attempts to announce its presence to your friends. As soon as I saw that pop-up attempt to post an ad to my wall when the installation finished, I couldn't get the application off my PC fast enough.
Get a Facebook privacy rating in an instant
Testing your Facebook privacy settings with the ReclaimPrivacy.org scanner is a three-step process: drag the Scan for Privacy bookmark link from the service's home page to your browser's toolbar, open your Facebook Privacy settings, and click the Scan for Privacy bookmark. The scanner opens at the top of the browser window, and after a few seconds, an icon indicates Caution or Secure, along with a link to the Facebook settings it suggests you change.
ReclaimPrivacy.org's Facebook privacy scanner warns of potential security risks to your personal information.
When I tested the scanner, the Caution alert persisted until I had reset the Facebook account's privacy options to nearly the most conservative possible. At these settings, only friends can interact with you in any way, and most of your personal information is hidden even from them.
You don't get a Secure rating in RleclaimPrivacy.org's scan until you've severely limited access to your Facebook information.
But sharing is what Facebook is all about. You can make yourself nearly invisible to all but a handful of Facebook friends, but for most people, that defeats the purpose. Part of the fun of Facebook is friending all sorts of people and enjoying the eclectic mix of status updates and other posts that are likely to scroll by at any given time.
The real value of the ReclaimPrivacy.org is that it prompts you to update your Facebook privacy settings. It seems every time I do, I end up making some change so I share a little less.
Facebook privacy app feels more like an invasion
Like many Facebook apps, you're prompted during installation of Connect in Private's Secure My Profile to grant the program permission to access your account. In fact, the scanner won't function unless you do so.
After the app finishes its initial privacy scan, it pops up a window offering to post a self-promoting ad to your wall and your friends' home pages. (Note that ReclaimPrivacy.org's scanner has a link for telling your friends about the service, but it's much less obtrusive than Secure My Profile's pop-up window.)
Connect in Private's Secure My Profile Facebook app attempts to post an ad for the service to your wall.
I declined the offer and continued the evaluation but made sure to uninstall the app as soon as it was finished. Maybe it's harsh to expect a freeware vendor not to advertise, but I prefer it do so somewhere other than my Facebook wall.
Before it runs the privacy scan, Secure My Profile asks you two general questions about how willing you are to share your personal information and your images and posts.
Secure My Profile asks you to rate your willingness to share Facebook information via five preset options.
(Credit: Connect in Private)Next, you're asked to set privacy preferences in more detail using Facebook's own presets: Everyone, Friends of Friends, Only Friends, and Only Me.
Decide on a case-by-case basis who is allowed to access your Facebook data via Connect in Private's Secure My Profile app.
(Credit: ConnectInPrivate)After you make your selections, Secure My Profile presents a graph showing your rating for profile info, contact info, and searchability. If the ratings are low, you're prompted to reset your privacy options so they better match the preferences you set earlier.
Secure My Profile shows a graph of your privacy rating in three Facebook categories: profile info, contact info, and searchability.
(Credit: Connect in Private)For me, Secure My Profile's comprehensive approach to rating your Facebook privacy is overkill. You can do almost as well by going through the privacy settings yourself, without having to install an application. Conversely, ReclaimPrivacy.org's straightforward approach makes up in speed and simplicity what it lacks in versatility.
Google is listening.
As Marguerite Reardon and Tom Krazit reported on May 14 in CNET's Signal Strength blog, the search giant has swept up wireless-network addresses, along with other data its Street View vehicles have been collecting on their unprecedented world tour.
Google or some other company may have already plotted the location of your home or office wireless network, but you can make it more difficult for the next nosy megacorporation--or a neighbor or passing stranger--to discover your hot spot by disabling its Service Set Identifier (SSID).
By default, wireless access points transmit their presence to let wireless devices discover them. Even though a determined sniffer can use other techniques to find the network, running silent will discourage low-effort snoops.
The first line of wireless defense is an encrypted, password-protected connection, which every network should use. If your network is used by a small number of devices that store its SSID and/or connect automatically, you may not need to broadcast the network's name.
Instructions for turning off an access point's SSID transmission vary from device to device. Open your router's settings and disable the option for "SSID Broadcast" or something similar. For example, the steps for doing so on a Linksys WAP54G router are on the Linksys support site.
Get a load of Google's lowdown on you
To view the information Google's servers store about you (or at least the amount the company is willing to fess up to storing), sign in to your Google account and scroll through the Google Dashboard. On a single page you'll find settings for and information about your Gmail, Google Docs, Google Calendar, Google Voice, YouTube, and other Google accounts, including an extensive search history. (I described how to slice and dice your Google Web history in a post from last July.)
The dashboard is a great way to review and update your Google profile, Checkout purchase information, Google Sync settings, Picasa Web albums, and contacts. You can also revoke access to any service you've allowed to connect directly to your Google account by clicking the "Websites authorized to access the account" link under Accounts. This opens a window listing all such services along with a link to remove each one, if you wish.
The Google Dashboard makes it easy to revoke a service's permission to access your account automatically.
(Credit: Google)The Google Toolbar for Firefox takes the sharing to another level but also gives you slightly more control over the personal information you store on Google servers. For example, click the wrench drop-down menu on the right, choose Options, and click the Search tab. The options to store your search history locally and see suggested search terms as you type are selected by default.
The search settings in the Google Toolbar let you customize some of the information you share with Google.
(Credit: Google)Also selected by default is the option at the bottom of the dialog to share usage statistics with Google. Some toolbar features may require this setting to be enabled to function properly, but there's really no harm in not sharing more than necessary with Google.
Note that there's no equivalent toolbar for Google's own Chrome browser, but Chrome is in many ways one big Google toolbar.
Of course, the best way to prevent Google from maintaining a dossier on your Web habits is by using a competing service. But that company is just as likely to find out and record everything it can about you. These services may not cost any money, but that doesn't mean they're free. The price we pay for the convenience of universal access to our digital lives is any real semblance of privacy.
But the fact is, much of the work we do in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and other Office apps can be accomplished perfectly well using the basic features available in the Web-based equivalents to these and other desktop apps. Here's a quick look at three such services, all of which offer both free and paid versions. I'll also describe a bunch of specialty sites that can help smooth out your workday.
Top Web-based Office alternatives
Three of the best-known Web suites — Google Docs, Zoho, and ThinkFree Online — remain at the top of the category. All three let you create and edit Word documents (DOC), Excel spreadsheets (XLS), and PowerPoint presentations (PPT). The free versions let you share files and folders, but for industrial-strength collaboration, security, and other features businesses require, you need to pay annual fees of $30 to $70 per user.
In addition to browser-based word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation modules, ThinkFree offers an online file viewer and a PDF converter, while Zoho features dozens of specialty apps, including a note-taker, e-mail, and wiki.
The business versions of the three services take very different approaches. The free Google Apps Standard Edition is intended for groups of up to 50 who want to share calendars, collaborate on standard Office files, create a Web site or wiki, and even get a custom e-mail domain. The Premier edition costs $50 per user per year and offers the infrastructure to support an organization's entire network.
The key is that the whole operation resides on Google servers. By contrast, ThinkFree's downloadable Office alternative costs $50 and runs as a standard desktop program. And ThinkFree Enterprise is installed on the customer's own servers. Zoho's many Web-based business tools are free for very small groups or a handful of uses; for subscriptions priced from $10 to $100, you get unlimited use of the programs and usually more features as well. Zoho's apps include Web conferencing, e-mail hosting, CRM, invoicing, and project management.
Zoho's free online invoice application provides basic billing and customer management.
(Credit: Zoho)The word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation components of Google Docs, ThinkFree, and Zoho look and feel much like their Office counterparts — at least the pre-ribbon Office. For example, the Java-based ThinkFree Write features the familiar toolbars and drop-down menus for selecting font sizes and styles and other formatting options. You even get a handful of drawing tools that Google Docs, Zoho Writer, and other online word processors can't match. (Zoho Writer gets bonus points for supporting footers and headers, watermarks, and other relatively advanced word processing features.)
ThinkFree Writer looks much like a desktop word processing program and offers plenty of not-so-basic features.
(Credit: ThinkFree) Specialty services complement Office programs
Other Web productivity tools make quick work of typical PC tasks. To create a PDF version of a Word document, image, or other type of file in a jiffy, browse to 7-PDF Web Portal, which lets you choose one of five resolutions and ten JPEG compression levels for your PDF.
For creating and editing images in a browser, try Pixlr Editor. The service provides more than a dozen filters and supports layers and color levels. Slider controls let you adjust an image's hue, saturation, brightness, contrast, and other aspects.
To go beyond your word processor's spelling and grammar checks, paste your prose into the Paper Rater service to get a complete analysis of the text, including its originality (and the likelihood it is plagiarized). In addition to spotting potential grammar and spelling errors, the service also rates your style and vocabulary and suggests alternative words.
Even with Windows' built-in Calc applet, I sometimes find myself needing a little help with my math. There's no faster way to calculate a percentage or perform other basic mathematical operation than the Instacalc Online Calculator. Just enter your equation, such as "27% of 285714," "10 inches in cm," or "100 USD in euro" and the solution appears almost immediately. Now all I need is a site that will answer the question, "where did I put my keys?"
Facebook is taking a lot of heat — again — about failing to protect the privacy of its users. (See Caroline McCarthy's The Social blog for a recap of the service's most-recent security gaffes.)
No matter what safety precautions Facebook and other social networks and Web sites take, eventually somebody's private data will become public, whether due to human error or a successful hack attack. Either way, your Web activities and the personal information you post to an online profile may be viewed by strangers, regardless of the account's security settings.
There are ways to minimize the risk of someone misusing your personal information. The Asia Pacific Privacy Authorities — led by Australia's Office of the Privacy Commissioner — have declared this Privacy Awareness Week, so why not take a few minutes to complete an ID theft risk assessment to help you find weak spots in your privacy defenses?
The test's 11 categories include online shopping, PCs, and passwords, but they also cover your wallet, your garbage, and your (physical) mailbox. Particularly timely are the questions on protecting the personal information you share online.
The ID theft risk assessment tool covers everything from garbage to passwords and online shopping.
(Credit: Asia Pacific Privacy Authorities)After you answer the rater's 40-or-so questions, you see your privacy-awareness score on a scale of 1 to 100. The privacy test won't tell you how to check the strength of your firewall and antimalware software, but it does serve as a timely reminder that threats to our privacy and financial security take many forms.
Filter potentially dangerous sites
It's no mystery that many of the Web's criminals lurk in the seamy neighborhoods intended only for adults — and not necessarily law-abiding ones. All the popular browsers let you block sites in various unsavory categories automatically or allow only the sites you specify. The free OpenDNS service maximizes your Web-filtering options and also displays statistics about your browsing.
These include your Web activity by hour and a complete list of the sites you've visited along with the number of visits to each. The free service archives your statistics for two weeks; longer histories are one of the many extras in the Deluxe version, which covers a family with up to five members for $10 a year. For businesses, the Deluxe service costs $5 per user per year.
The free OpenDNS service gives you a detailed view of your Web activity and lets you block or allow specific sites.
(Credit: OpenDNS)OpenDNS offers three built-in filter levels: the highest setting blocks everything from adult content to "time-wasters"; moderate's 13 blocked categories focus on adult sites and illegal activities; and the lowest built-in setting stymies four categories of adult-only sites. You can create your own filter by blocking sites in any of OpenDNS's 55 categories. Other tools let you determine whether a specific site is blocked, correct typos automatically, upload your own image, and customize the message that appears when a site is blocked ("Shouldn't you be doing your homework?")
The service's widespread network of Web-cache servers promises to speed up your browsing, though I didn't test this, nor did I notice pages loading any faster when browsing via OpenDNS servers. For people who use dynamic IP addresses, the OpenDNS support page explains how to use the DNS-o-Matic applet to connect to Web services — including OpenDNS itself — that normally require a static IP address. And for a closer look at OpenDNS's features, check out the service's video-tutorial library.
Integrate your social networks with Yoono
If you find yourself jumping between Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn, and other social networks, you can view all your network alerts in a single window by adding Yoono to Firefox (the program is also available as a standalone application).
After you install the add-on, a set of icons is added to the left margin of the browser window. Click the top double-chevron icon to open the Yoono sidebar. The first time you open the sidebar, you're prompted to allow Yoono to access your social-network accounts. This usually involves signing into the various accounts and clicking through a series of permission screens.
Grant Yoono access to your accounts on popular social networks to add alerts and previews to Firefox.
(Credit: Yoono)
See all your social-network alerts in a single browser window with the Yoono Firefox add-on.
(Credit: Yoono)You can scroll through each vertical column of alerts and hover over an entry to see options for commenting/replying, deleting, and hiding or grouping alerts from that person. Yoono lets you update your status on multiple networks simultaneously, although I didn't test this feature. Likewise, I didn't try out Yoono's IM features.
I'm more interested in the program's ability to consolidate friend and colleague updates from many social networks. By default, Yoono displays new alerts in a small pop-up window in the bottom right of the screen. To turn off or modify alerts, click the options button to open the settings window. Click More options to open a six-tabbed dialog box that lets you control updates more precisely.
Deactivate some or all Yoono updates by clicking "options" when an alert window opens.
(Credit: Yoono)It's difficult to trust any service with such sensitive information about you, your family, your friends, and work colleagues. Yoono's privacy policy states that the service uses a token system that prevents it from knowing your Facebook sign-in name and password. With other services, however, your login info is stored encrypted on Yoono's servers if the program can't store the sign-in data on the client.
Even more potentially troublesome is the service's Discovery widget that searches for and retrieves Web pages similar to the ones you're viewing. Your browsing is tracked by third-party ad networks, although Yoono claims not to provide any "personally identifiable information." Unfortunately, the third parties may be privy to your IP address, which many people consider personally identifiable.
Privacy concerns aside, there's no simpler way to stay up-to-date on several social networks at the same time than Yoono's Firefox sidebar and multipane browser window. (Note that Yoono is donationware; the authors request a $5 donation if you use the program.)
The Facebook-only approach
If your social networking is confined to Facebook, an integrated solution such as Yoono is overkill. The Facebook Toolbar is a more conventional Firefox addition. In addition to a Facebook search box, the toolbar has buttons for uploading photos, sharing the current page, and viewing the number of unread messages and pending friend requests.
The Facebook Toolbar shows the number of pending messages and friend requests and provides a Facebook search box, among other features.
(Credit: Facebook)
The Facebook Toolbar's configuration options let you decide the actions that generate an alert or disable all alerts.
(Credit: Facebook)Like Yoono's sidebar, the Facebook Toolbar lets you open a window on the left side of the Firefox screen and view alerts by last update, status or profile update time, or name.
See your most recent Facebook-update alerts in a Firefox sidebar opened by clicking a button on the Facebook Toolbar.
(Credit: Facebook Toolbar) Tweet from Firefox's address bar
For fast access to your Twitter account, it's tough to beat the TwitterBar, which puts a bluebird icon on the right side of the Firefox address bar. Hover over the icon to enable a Post to Twitter link and see how many characters you have left. TwitterBar asks that you confirm the post before sending it.
Right-click the bluebird to see links for adding an account and opening the TwitterBar options dialog. By default TwitterBar displays the OneRiot search bar when you hover over its bluebird icon in the address bar. OneRiot searches the "social Web" for the text you've entered. To disable this feature, check "Hide the OneRiot search icon in the address bar." You can choose one of three URL-shortening services, change the default text that accompanies the links you post, and disable the confirmation warning that appears before posts are sent, among other options.
TwitterBar's options include a choice of three URL shorteners and whether to show or hide alerts and specific icons.
(Credit: TwitterBar)TwitterBar can't match the features of either Yoono or the Facebook Toolbar, but the add-on makes tweeting about the sites you visit even easier. Please note that like Yoono, TwitterBar is donationware, so if you find yourself using the program regularly, cough up the $5 solicitation to help keep the good software coming.
