Letters to PC World, July 2007

Life-Saving Freebies

Regarding May's "Freebies That Saved Lives" [a section of "101 Fantastic Freebies" that reported how U.S. Air Force personnel used Craigslist and Google Earth to rescue Hurricane Katrina victims]: I have to say this is the only time an article in PC World made me cry.

Now I understand why, when I was out of state desperately watching every newscast for information and trying to catch any info on street names and locations, they were not providing any. Those reporters probably didn't have a clue where in the city they were. I sincerely hope the military branches and all other emergency responders have incorporated this idea into their planning for future disasters. I am sending a letter to our city planners about this article, as in the wake of the storm they were definitely caught unprepared with regard to technology.

As we here in Louisiana now know, with the unexpected loss of cellular towers and the inability to use cell phones to call out at a critical time, and with the loss of electricity that is normally expected after an event like Katrina, technology is not 100 percent reliable in times of emergency--but when it does work, as in this case, there is nothing better.

Patricia Maroney, Kenner, Louisiana

More Great Freebies

I enjoyed "101 Fantastic Freebies" [May], but I think you missed one of the best Web sites out there: Doodle. It is great for scheduling meetings. You create a meeting poll with a list of possible dates and times, and then you send a meeting invitation to colleagues or friends through e-mail. The recipients follow the link and select which days and times work for them, so you see which dates work for the most people.

Ari Shaw-Faber, Albuquerque, New Mexico

Kudos to Preston Gralla for his choice of winner in the "Notepad Replacement" category. I have used NoteTab Light for years for all my needs--HTML, PHP, JavaScript, C++, and more I can't remember--and have enjoyed ease of use and great features the whole way.

I was surprised, however, at his omission of a software RSS reader that over 1 million users already have installed on their machines. Firefox has great built-in support for RSS feeds. You add these feeds as you would any other bookmark, and after that they are simple and easy to use. I don't know why anyone would download a stand-alone RSS reader if they already have Firefox installed.

Ryan Stalets, Riverton, Illinois

I was rather disappointed to see that Yahoo's My Yahoo (beta) was not included in your article. In a recent beta upgrade of its service, Yahoo added enhanced RSS integration, made everything more Ajax-y, and updated the user interface to resemble Yahoo.com more.

Trevor Huxham, Plano, Texas

RFID Credit Cards

Regarding "New Credit Cards Leak Personal Info" [News and Trends, May]: Thanks so much for a great article. Even though I have an American Express card (like the one pictured in the article), I never knew what that chip in the card did. Since the article raised my concern about it, I called American Express. It turns out that the chip can be deactivated with a phone call to the customer service department. Mine is now deactivated.

Bob Scalcione, via e-mail

Editor's response: To clarify, American Express says it can turn off ExpressPay processing for an account so that your "Blue" card can no longer be used for contactless purchases--but that procedure doesn't actually disable the chip in the card, leaving it theoretically readable (though it won't send out your name). If you don't want contactless technology in your card, you'll have to ask the company for a new one.

Erik Larkin

I can't believe credit card companies are so oblivious to the dangers involved with broadcasting credit card information via RFID. A couple of thieves on a crowded subway could collect a basketful of information during one rush hour.

Phil Sasak, Solon, Ohio

Spyware Removal

One missed tool for removing spyware [Hassle-Free PC, May] that I use, in addition to some of those mentioned, is X-Setup Pro. I had to use it to eradicate a piece of spyware that hijacked my search page in Internet Explorer. No other tool, not even HijackThis, would remove this spyware.

Matt Tyler, via e-mail

I would like to say a big thank you for the article "How to Free Your PC From Spyware." I thought I was never going to rid my PC of the Starware adware program, but your suggestions worked. And I actually had other such items on my computer that I wasn't even aware of.

Robin Thompson, Phoenix

Antispam Addresses

Erik Larkin wrote about disposable e-mail addresses to shut down spammers [Privacy Watch, May], and he mentioned a couple of services costing $20 per year. However, I have used Spamex happily for the past several years, for about $10 per year. I can have 500 disposable addresses that I can turn on and off. And an antispam utility that comes free from my ISP, Road Runner, works well in a different manner: I can put a block on any address from which I don't wish to receive messages again. After a couple of weeks, most of the spam went to quarantine.

Jack L. Underwood, Schenectady, New York

Great tips on disposable e-mail addresses. I have a fourth to recommend: a harvest-proof e-mail link that costs nothing and that you use on your Web site (if you have one). Why pay anything when you can employ the services of one of the Internet's most reliable programmers?

Will Bontrager, known for his excellent WillMaster Web development software (much of which is free), came up with a nifty idea. Go to flow-to.com to read about it and to give it a try. It's especially useful if you have a special e-mail address with your ISP.

Judy Vorfeld, Peoria, Arizona

Noisy Software

To any software developers who may base their product features on Stephen Manes's columns, especially the May one ["Software That Just Won't Shut Up," Full Disclosure]: Don't listen to him! Thank you.

Seriously, Stephen Manes is entitled to his opinion about the sounds coming from computers, but there have been so many times I have said to myself, "Software should use aural cues much more often than they do," that I just had to write.

Stephen, turn off your speakers, or use the options for your software to make it quiet. As for me, I like the audible notifications, and we could use more--except once (for real), my wife told me she thought there was a strange man in the house while I was gone, and it turned out to be the Avast antivirus software saying the virus database had been updated. (Okay, that one's kind of loud.)

Software developers, please put sounds (soft, quiet ones) in your software, and we'll turn off the ones we don't like.

Marvin Biver, Okeechobee, Florida

I agree with every point Manes made in his article, and I would like to add a few more to his list. But I'm sure we all have our favorites.

I find myself losing more productive time having to constantly babysit antivirus, security-suite, and backup programs as well as needing to update Microsoft programs and add the latest operating system fixes and patches. There really should be a better way.

Can't some engineering software guru write something so that all you have to do is drop these time-consuming programs in a single utility, schedule when the update takes place, and be done with it?

Is there anyone in tech land who can unburden us PC users and make us really productive again?

John Meyer, Northridge, California

Hot Topics in Forums: A PC Calamity, Better Dial-Up, Opera

Here are some of the hot topics going on now in our forums. Take part in our community discussions.

PC Disasters: One time, I was trying to install an ethernet adapter; somehow I cut a wire, and when I turned the computer on, it pretty much caught on fire.

--zboner

Sticking With Dial-Up: It is a lot easier these days to configure a dial-up connection than it used to be. If you have a dial-up modem, chances are its driver is already in XP. Also, most ISPs that are still in the dial-up business have software that speeds up the connection by one method or another, which can give you a nice boost.

--Keeter

Opera vs. Firefox: You should probably spend a little more time discovering what Opera can do. There is definitely no way it can be described as "bare-bones." I am pretty confident that almost any feature Firefox has, Opera had first, and does it better, without [your] having to download and manage additional plug-ins.

--MoonDogg