Reflection: Those (Very) Protective Anti-Virus Programs

September 18 was the day Toto's free trial of McAfee ran out (or so it told me). It was hard to use the little netbook in the days leading up to September 18 as McAfee kept flashing dire warnings. I felt I had things under control, but the security program knew how to tug at my heart strings.

On the evening of the 17th, I looked up security programs, some free, some in the neighborhood of $30 to $40. It seemed like the free version of AVG did less than it used to -- understandable, I suppose, in a freemium world. Still, the free program would stave off crisis. Windows gave us a firewall, and AVG would at least momentarily give us our anti-virus; later I could decide if I wanted to purchase something additional for Toto and Snookums.

Now here is where things got curious: AVG proceeded to download more than it indicated it would -- or so it seems. (It wouldn't want to see anything happen on its shift.) Also, it is the 20th now, and McAfee is hanging around longer than indicated. It appears it is thoughtfully giving me a grace period. (Will it win my heart yet?) It put up an icon that we were in a state of alert (no protection? low protection?) But when I plugged my camera in, it warned me that there was this device connected... and did I want it to scan the thing? Perhaps McAfee has downgraded itself, but it has not left. I picture it like the Cheshire cat -- some part remaining.

Choices, choices... I guess most security program companies offer some sort of free download that's separate from their trial. Some offer more, some less. McAfee has a curious program that will let you know whether the security program you currently have installed (whatever it might be) is behaving properly. It will tell you things like, "CA Security reports that things are peachy keen. But if you want even more protection, you can upgrade to McAfee TOTAL Protection now." Snookums-the-Netbook has one of those programs. So far I have not felt the need to get Toto one.

photo: pittaya

Reflection: Uploading Oneself to the Internet...

I did an online test of my netbook's internet connectivity speed. The upload speed was slower than the upload speed, yes, but not by as much as is usually the case. The upload speed measured at close to average for all computers with similar ISP addresses, while the download speed was markedly slower. What does it mean that the netbook has a much better upload speed than download speed? It (like me) shows, relative to the general population, marked adaptation/ preference for uploading itself to the internet as opposed to merely downloading.

Reflection: Netbook Attachment II / Beautiful to my Ears

I read somewhere that if a netbook quieted down when you picked it up, the noise was probably coming from the fan, and not the hard drive. So does that mean netbooks are like babies -- they seek human contact and go hush-a-bye when you hold them? (Or do you suppose it has more to do with circulating air?)

The netbook in the picture is mine. It was christened Aubrey, but it answers to Snookums. I have thought at points of doing a Squidoo page for this here netbook. It could recommend some products/ security programs, and I could include some blog posts where it appears as the charming creature it is.

Perhaps I shouldn't personify it too much, though... I've been concerned about it this week. It's a bit noisy, though not as noisy as the noisy Acer netbooks people have seen fit to post to YouTube. If it were to need a major new part... ah, well, better than getting a new netbook.

Snookums, you and I are going places! This here is the best netbook because... well, rather than give you pragmatic reasons I could give a mishmash of stuff straight out of The Little Prince and The Velveteen Rabbit. Seaking of which... do you suppose there might be a Blue Fairy for netbooks, a fairy who swoops down and gets them eventually, and says thing like, "You have been an absolutely awesome Acer Aspire One netbook. Before you were real to Karen. Now you shall be real to everyone."

Reflection: CA Security and 'Snookums'

After the two-week trial of McAffee security software wore off (some months back) I installed the CA Security Suite that Radio Shack had included as a promotion. I preferred (and indeed somewhat missed) the McAffee program. Still, I am glad that I have not only refrained from referring to CA as "the currently installed dictator" but that also, when CA sends up a popup telling me what it's protected me from thusfar (mostly 'inbound connections' and adware) I say "Thank you," quite politely as I click the message.

Well, CA has come to the netbook's rescue on two recent occasions. Once I got a message of some threat that appeared to come from Windows, and foolishly clicked; immediately it was obvious that I had entered some other website that was merely masquerading as a Windows window. CA sent up a message about a virus-infected file; apparently it dealt with the file quite adequately (zapped it? cleaned it?) on contact. It was then that I threw in the "dear". "Thank you, dear," I say when it sends up one of those boxes to numerate the various things it's blocked or otherwise dealt with, and remind me that it's protecting my computer.

Then came the second incident. Apparently there was a third-party module on Squidoo that was briefly compromised/set to download contaminants. CA dealt with that smoothly as well. Well, hmmm, there are only so many ways one can express gratitude to a security program. I'm already calling it "dear"; I'm not about to upgrade it to "Snookums". (I reserve that term for the netbook itself.)

That picture is not Snookums, by the way. Snookums is "wittel-wer" and cuter. A few people might recognize that laptop photo from my "Struggling to Pass Brain Chemistry" piece, linked to in a previous post.

Now about that piece: I came home to a message from a "Giant Squid" who had written something in my "guestbook" that she had intended to be anonymous but that her name appeared alongside. She wanted her words deleted as she was concerned that they might reveal information that was told to her in confidence. I deleted of course -- but I was glad for the opportunity to have read her words. I had titled that guestbook "Similar situation?" but I hadn't necessarily expected another Squidoo-er would pour out so much in that particular spot. There are a lot of writers on the site, and sometimes one of them has indeed been searching for something similar... In our hearts and minds, we are sometimes closer than we realize, but we don't know 'til we open our mouths.

Reflection: Using Love and Logic With Your Blog

As I noted before, on eduFire one can teach just about anything that's legal. I was thinking about doing a follow-up to the free "Upload Yourself to the Internet" class: one that focused specifically on Blogger. I was also thinking about the connection between raising a blog and raising a kid. Things to consider when raising a blog: helping your blog make friends -- and helping your blog find and articulate its values, resist peer pressure, and discover social service opportunities... Of course there's also the 'Link Within' widget, and other fun educational games you can play with your blog.

I have training in a classroom management system called Love and Logic. At first, I couldn't think of any connection between Love and Logic and raising a Blogspot blog. Then I thought of something. In Love and Logic, you're supposed to give I-messages instead of "Don't" messages; for instance, you might say, "I am now passing out construction paper to the children who are sitting quietly." Well, I'm thinking one might say to their their blog, "I am now passing out links to those websites that are following editorial guidelines."

The thing is, though, that if I were to say that to this blog, it would likely just think, "Oh, now she's passing out links to those websites that are following editorial guidelines," and continue with whatever it was doing. It has some motivation to help out my other sites -- up to a point. It is very willing, though, to bypass having the other sites link to it -- so that it can have more liberties when it comes to doing its own thing. Well, that gets to one of the deeper tenets of Love and Logic. We may give rewards or consequencess based on what we think we know about what motivates 'kids' or what motivates 'people' -- but some won't respond to those things. (Just as some blogs aren't motivated by SEO.)

Reflection: With Apologies to Journey...

And now I've turrned to you-u with O-open Office... (Don't worry, I won't do a video for that one.) Several of my colleagues were discussing, in a forum thread, how to move presentation slides from one type of file to another (ie PPt, Adobe, Open Office) without losing formatting. Turns out... if you save a slide as a PNG, you can't alter it -- it's permanent -- but you sure can preserve it! You can almost see the lacquer, preserving the text as image, holding the formatting inside.

Ah, so here's another metaphor: Some files are designed for flexibility at the expense of stability, while others are designed for stability at the expense of flexibility. So it is, too, with people. Me, I'm of course hyperstable, abnormally so. I can be uploaded, downloaded, imported, exported, all with no change in formatting, no loss of emotion or memory. Some people are the opposite: They're remarkably easily to work with, from an editing standpoint, yet others are oft left wondering where the formatting went.

(Nothing to hide, believe what I say, 'cause here I amm, with O-open Office...)

In-Between Reflection: Messages From God!?

Among the many gadgets you can add to an I-Google homepage: There's an app titled 'Messages From God'. It pays to read the fine print, though -- 'cause guess what? God didn't develop the app, and God didn't upload it.

Reflection: Please Don't Email the Drops

I'm using a site called Drop.io to upload my audio readings to the internet. They call the uploaded files 'drops'. Some people use Drop.io for online collaboration (like a multi-media Google Document); I guess that's why they assign the drops their own email addresses and their own telephone numbers with five-digit extensions. They really do have those drops set up! Please don't email my drops, though. There are people who can attest to me not reading my own e-mail -- I'm afraid the chances are slim to none of my drops reading theirs... Now I'm going to backtrack and briefly mention my bad-news phobia: A couple years back, I was explaining my telephone anxieties to my friend-whose-name-is-spelled-the-same-forwards-and-backwards. ("You can have your address put on a list so telemarketers don't call," he had said, showing a lack of undertanding of just what it was that made me startle when the phone rang. Of course it wasn't the telemarketers I had been worried about -- it was the people I knew. I was worried about things happening to the people I knew.) Now, though, I'm wondering if telemarketers -- automated ones -- are going to call my drops up on the telephone. Do you suppose they might tell my drops they can save money on auto insurance, or that their new satellite dish will be installed tomorrow?

Reflection: If You Need Anything, I'll be in the System Tray

Several computer giants are competing for the allegiance of my small netbook. My Google toolbar offered to import my Microsoft favorites, and then Microsoft told me it could post to Blogger for me, using Windows Live. I clicked on the Windows Live icon out of curiosity even though I don’t have an account. Lo and behold, a Messenger showed up, and, like a genie sprung from a bottle, it refused to leave. I clicked on the Messenger’s ‘X’ and it told me that, just in case I were to need something, it would still be running in my system tray. I actually was writing this particular entry in Microsoft Works, offline, when an ad appeared for Hotmail -- 'Get it now!' -- with a picture of a guy whopping himself in the head like he just realized he could have had a V-8. So the other day, I was installing a security program that Radio Shack had given me as a promotional giveaway… I unchecked a couple boxes as the program was installing. If I hadn’t unchecked those boxes, you know what the security suite was planning to do? It was fixing to set Yahoo as my homepage and install my new Yahoo toolbar…

In-Between Reflection: Faster friends?

First of all, meet my computer: It's a bitty Acer One netbook that runs XP: the kind of computer you want to talk baby talk to , not because it's a lesser computer, but because it's cute. As soon as I turned the thing on, it started sniffing around for wireless connections (now that seems like major technology to me!) and sending messages: "Google would like to install a toolbar here. Please let Google know whether it can install a toolbar here." The computer seems so competent, it made me wonder: just what are those important tasks the expensive laptops do that this bitty wittle computery-wutery (please do excuse the phrasing) does not do. I was thinking about that when I passed a sign -- "3 G: faster friends" Faster friends??!

In-Between: Google Docs

I've begun putting up links to a few writings (as Google Docs).

My business site has Google Docs sticking to it as well. I like them for kid's activity sheets and worksheets -- they print well -- plus I can access Google from any computer (whereas I sometimes have to go as far as Bellevue to catch InMotion). The search engines don't index Google Docs, but they don't mind people plastering them to websites like they were Bandaids.

You know how some versions of Microsoft Office have an animated paper clip that acts like it's your online personal assistant... it leans in to observe what you're doing periodically, then seems to scamper off. For an online personal assistant, I have an imaginary animated Google Googlie. It spends a fair amount of time observing what I am doing -- and sometimes its eyes grow large indeed -- but it is usually too polite to say anything.

Reflection: Conversation with an Animated Search Engine

I may post sad tiding on the internet, but I don't like it when people I know post less-than-happy things. It's one of my few areas of do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do.

I have some specific phobias: specifically, bad-news phobias.

Years back, a housemate asked me how someone so anxiety-disordered could teach. I said it was simple: My family didn't have my phone number where I worked, so why would I be anxious there? Work was a relative la-la land of newlessness.

Blogs, though, are often two-way communication. So before I ventured to put one up, I had a serious conversation with an imaginary animated icon, a little Googlie...

Indeed. A little Googlie. Microsoft has an animated paper clip on some versions of its word processing software. I envision Google with its own -- maybe not an animated paper clip, but some other very animated icon.

I spent some time rehearsing things with that imaginary animated icon, specifically my expectations regarding its networking habits. I made sure it knew not to give out any personal information. I told it I didn't want a comment box just yet, either, and that I prefer it not to take subscriptions.

The imaginary animated icon has a very intelligent look about it, but it appears a bit doleful when you tell it not to take down information or disperse it freely.

Perhaps I might crawl your blog? it asked. A little looksie? I crawled some other stuff you put up, and I did a good job, don't you think?

I told it that I would consider letting it crawl the blog in the future, though not today.

Alright, what can I do for you today? it asked, resuming its usual eager-to-please font: Google Doc? Adwords? GoogleGoFetch, huh huh?