Computerboy.com

So, what you’re saying is that you don’t feel like there is enough crap to deal with out there, and that now the Macintosh OS X platform should be the target of virii and similar hell-spawn? YOU’RE CRAZY!!!!
What do you suppose causes people to let their tongues just blather on about such things? I read that the contest – item two below – was cancelled because thousands of people wrote in to say WTF?!? and they realized they might not have been thinking to clearly. Smart move.
MacInTouch Home Page:

David Coursey writes for eWeek about the lack of Mac OS X malware:

How do I know there are no Mac OS X viruses and malware out there?
Because the Mac product manager of one of the major security software companies told me so.
And when people tell me I don’t need their product, I usually take them at their word.
I won’t identify the person since he thought he was talking to me for a book project, but people at Apple were happy to confirm this to me.
They don’t put it in their advertising for obvious reasons.
Despite the good news, I am not telling you to turn off the anti-virus software that’s running on your Macintosh. And I still encourage you to purchase anti-virus protection for all your machines. Why spend the money?
First, because it’s possible the guy was wrong. Second, someone may have created a threat in the two weeks since I spoke to him (or may be about to). Third, your Mac probably has some Windows viruses or malware on it.

DVForge – Virus Prize 2005:
The Contest That, Sadly, Will Never Be
Contest goal: To lay to rest, once and for all, the myths surrounding the lack of spreading computer virii on the Macintosh OS X operating system, by sponsoring a contest that challenges virus writers to actually prove that they can introduce a harmless virus into two modern OS X Macs.
That was the goal of a contest announced recently by DVForge, but, due to a variety of influencing factors was cancelled shortly after having been announced.
ZDNet Australia: News:Security – Mac OS X faces hacker threats: Symantec

It’s nothing to do with M$’s dominance of the computer world – it’s that the PC’s, with Windows XP, can get so infested with crap – spyware, virii, whatever – that you have to wipe the drive and start over at some point. I reached that point today with my brother-in-laws computer. I hate admitting defeat, but there it is- I can’t fix this thing because the slime of the world have taken it over. Where’s that install disk…..

AppleMatters:Preparing the cadaver
They’ve taken an iPod Shuffle apart. Not much to it, which isn’t surprising, but it’s an interesting read.

If you’d like a gmail invite, post a comment below and I’ll send one to the first 3 people.

aka
Adam’s latest rant on the idiocy of spyware/adware/virii.
I’ve been dealing with a lot of spyware/adware/virii infestations of late, and it really bothers me. Granted, I shouldn’t complain – I might not have a job if some of this stuff was easier to do or not as problematic – but it just irks me.
Here’s the thing: the crap that I clean off someone’s computer is not their crap. Sure, it’s on their computer, but they didn’t ask for it to be installed – some idiot or company decided it would be a good idea to do it. In the case of the virus, it’s some kid who’s probably trying to get some attention. In the case of the spyware/adware, it’s a person, persons or a company trying to make some money. Guess what? If you do it without permission, it’s not that different from breaking and entering – at least in my mind, anyway.
I was trying to explain this whole phenomenon to my parents, and the best I could come up with is this:
Most spam is kind of like junk mail – it comes, you don’t want it, you just get rid of it. Spywayre/adware is more like the stuff you find on your car in a parking lot, stuck under the windshield wiper. You don’t want it, but you have to work to get rid of it. In some of the recent cases I’ve dealt with, it’s more like you’ve come back to your car to find the whole thing covered in take-out menus and info about local clubs. And when you finally get the stuff off the outside and get in, you find that they’ve also change the way the seat, mirrors and tilt-steering were set, and then changed the radio station pre-sets while they were at it.
Now, if that happened in real life, I could get someone arrested for that – but when it’s someone’s computer, no-one seems to care. Why is that?
How is this any different than someone hacking into a computer system and deleting or stealing data? How is it different from breaking into someone’s house and putting flyers in their fridge? It’s not! If you were caught breaking and entering in real life, you’d be arrested for trespassing – but not so when you do it online.
Now, I’ll grant you that some of this stuff is not all due to the “bad” people out there. If Microsoft did a better job with the software, some of the security holes that are used to get this stuff on the computer in the first place wouldn’t be there. And if they made it so that you have to approve of certain types of software installations, we wouldn’t have “drive-by downloads” happening just when you open a web page.
But another part of this is, to some extent, the fault of the end user. If you keep hearing about virii and spyware and adware on the tv and in the paper and at the water cooler, wouldn’t it make sense to look to see if the problem can be fixed? The anti-virus software that I use on my PC at home only costs $30 for a year. A whole year. That’s less than 0.09¢ a day. I probably have that much change sitting in various cracks and crevices in my car. How can you not pay for that?

If you’re using OS X and the number pad on your extended keyboard has stopped working, it might not be what you think.
Under OS X, certain programs can cause “Mouse Keys” to become active if the option key is pressed five times in a row. The mouse keys feature allows you to control the mouse with the numeric keypad – handy if the mouse stops working on you, for example.
If you move the mouse to the menu bar and hit the “5” key on your numeric keypad, does the menu open up? Press “5” again and it should disappear.
To turn this feature off, go to the System Preferences, then “Universal Access,” and then click on the “Mouse” tab. Turn off Mouse Keys, and make sure the “Press the Option key five times to turn Mouse Keys on or off” box is UN checked.

Having a little bit of trouble with a pesky piece of spyware, I turned to google for help. It provided, as usual….
“WAST” WINDOWS was the query – for dealing with what I thought was some spyware – and then Computer Associates served up the skinny on what I was dealing with and how to delete it.
The CA link was number two on the page – nice and respectful, and not making me hunt for more info “below the fold.” And people think it’s odd that I don’t like to carry notes with me…. All I have to do is get online and all I need is right there!!

The Imperator:
“Well, put simply, it’s a 1m long Star Destroyer PC case.”
You have to see it to believe it – but it’s pretty cool.
Another one: TablePC.

SiliconValley.com | 11/23/2004 | What color is your parachute now, Frank?:
apple.com/switch/stories/piper_jaffray: If Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster (no relation to Herman) wasn’t on Apple’s Christmas card list already, he is now. Apple stock soared to a four-year high Monday after Munster issued a research note predicting the company’s share price will reach $100 by 2006. Backing up Munster’s forecast was a survey of 200 iPod users in the United States that showed that 6 percent of former PC users bought a Mac after buying an iPod. Another 7 percent said they intended to buy a Mac within the next 12 months. “We believe that the remarkable satisfaction with the iPod creates a word-of-mouth wildfire that generates new customer interest in Apple products,” Munster wrote. “At the end of the day, we think the numbers justify the iPod’s reality in driving Apple’s business.”

palmOne – Support – Knowledge Library:
The application “HotSync Manager” could not be launched because of a shared library error: “4”
I am having a problem with my Palm computer, and the error I’m having is the phrase above. I did a search on Palm’s website, but wasn’t too successful. Knowing that the web will save the day, I decided to do a Google search on the error – and was led right to the page on the Palm support site that I had been looking for. What’s so interesting is that Google did it right away, but Palm kept beating around the bush and giving me bad suggestions….