MadMonkey: I've never quite understood the issue with MS shippinng IE with Windows. Of course operating system should be bundled with essential applications. It's always been a mystery to me why this is a legal issue? Can someone enlighten me?

I've only used IE occasionally in the last decade and surely it is inferior product compared to most other browsers i've used. But i still think that there really should be a web browser included in operation system install, at least as an option. And in Microsofts case IE is obvious selection for that.

puupia: Well I agree that they should be allowed to include a browser (IE) with their operating system.

.... BUT, it should be as an additional pieces of software that can EASILY be removed from the operating system.

Just like the game solitary comes with every window computer, but at the same time you can easily go and remove it from windows. But Microsoft went and built part of the OS around IE, so makes it hard to remove (well hard for any normal everyday user)

puupia: A good question

I read an article a while back that said the EU were going to make MS include more than ONE browser on there systems (obviously IE, Firefox and another). This seems to of changed though with what has been released.

I do not know what is going to happen. If there is no Browser on the system you buy, how do you download a different one . I think all Browsers are free, so there is no financial incentive as such anywhere. Maybe IE, Firefox etc... are all going to give away Cd's in shops or something, I will have a look round and see if i can find out

coan.net: I can easily install another browser and make it the default for the system. Even if IE is still installed i never have to use it. Why would that have to bother anyone?

puupia: I mean if there is no Browser at all on the system, HOW can you download another, as you will not be able to browse the web ?

OK, depending what you know, if you had Prism on your PC you could use that, but presuming its an off the shelf PC with nothing on what would one do

MadMonkey: Exactly. Thats a very good question. I never thought i'd say this, but i really think that IE should come with Windows :)

puupia: Even if IE is still installed i never have to use it. Why would that have to bother anyone?


I know what he means here.... I use firefox, and I had the damndest time trying to get IE away from me!


I always had pop ups etc, trying to reinstall it, or to make it my primary browser or whatever... even today, when I install updates, it trys to sneak in itself as my primary server, I have to manually install updates just to make sure it doesnt include making IE my new browser!

Czuch:

how is it possible to get any Windows Updates without going through IE ?

Use the following website.
http://windizupdate.com/
talen314

puupia: It's called (or so the EU decided) being anti-competition and decremental to a free market.

In its 2008 Annual Report Microsoft stated:[24]

“ The European Commission closely scrutinizes the design of high-volume Microsoft products and the terms on which we make certain technologies used in these products, such as file formats, programming interfaces, and protocols, available to other companies. In 2004, the Commission ordered us to create new versions of Windows that do not include certain multimedia technologies and to provide our competitors with specifications for how to implement certain proprietary Windows communications protocols in their own products. The Commission’s impact on product design may limit our ability to innovate in Windows or other products in the future, diminish the developer appeal of the Windows platform, and increase our product development costs. The availability of licenses related to protocols and file formats may enable competitors to develop software products that better mimic the functionality of our own products which could result in decreased sales of our products."

I'm not a big fan of MS products, but in this disputes my vote goes straight to Redmond. The EC stand, just as the US limitations are totally groundless and stupid at that. The reasons provided are just as silly as not permitting car manufacturers to install their own brand of radio, or come to that wheels, in the car they produce. The definition of a product is purely the decision of the manufacturer, not of the state. If MS decides that their product includes a browser then it's their decision, no one else's. No one is forced to buy a MS product. I don't, for one.

The fact that it is almost impossible, in most countries, to buy a comuter without Windows pre-installed is not a valid counter-argument. At most, this should be thrown at the computer manufacturers, but I would oppose that too, and on the same grounds. It's the manufacturer's decision what to include or not include in a product they sell. If a sufficient number of consumers becomes unhappy with the forced link there will be someone to bring into the market a computer without a pre-installed Windows.

rabbitoid:

.... are you really in support of a free market type economy??? Oh my, what will the socialists think? You will be shunned from society by those smarter than everyone else liberals? Isnt the government meant to protect us in every aspect of our lives??? I think the government should just take over the computer industry all together? Please mr government, please protect me from mean ol mr IE

rabbitoid: I feel the idea is to open more possibilities on how a person buys his or her PC.... I mean "windows" is not a Microsoft idea, they just borrowed the idea off others and adapted it for the PC.

One valid counter-arguement comes to buying a PC from a second hand shop. Often the discs can be missing... so, why is it that the main option in the case of a computer needing re-installing that the customer has to buy a windows disk? I know there are other options, but Microsoft have made it hard for others to offer an alternative(s)

This gives an more open market.

Czuch: IE is not really needed anymore, and it would be quite easy for a shop to have at the counter a choice of browsers for people to install, or a single disk with a selection of browsers that comes in the box.

Also IE is not the safest browser on the web, so why bundle a greater security risk with a PC??

(V): '"windows" is not a Microsoft idea' : Windows is a valid MS product unless a court decides otherwise. The fact that the Mac OS was there before is immaterial, since Apple did not act on it. If there was a copyright infringement we would heve heard about it a long time ago.

'the customer has to buy a windows disk' : Well no, not in France, anyway. If you buy at a second hand shop a PC without a disc you can easily buy a new clean disc and install on it whatever you like: A MS product (Windows, presumably) which you can buy at a store for a certain amount of $$; or easily find a free, perfectly legal non-MS operating system, which you may or may not know how to operate. The third option, which is slightly illegal, is to install an unpayed MS product - at your own risk.

rabbitoid: The windows idea was created by other companies for their computers, they just nicked the concept and called theirs "Windows".. Not just Apple, but Commodore and Atari were using similar ideas before Microsoft saw the light.

France only so far... this is why the EU came down on Microsoft. And why again for something that is supposed to be with the machine? I took Microsoft to task on this regarding a law they made regarding windows which stopped a laptop manufacturer keeping copies on the laptops restart disk after a certain period of time. They admitted fault and sent me a XP disk

So why cannot it be presumes that Windows came with a PC/laptop and replacements be free or for a small cost rather than having to pay a lot of money?

As to third party products... this is the point, to open up the market so the existing ones and new ones are available.

And I won't download a 'disc' that is so basic for the machine. Too much risk of things going wrong.

(V): Good luck to you against MS. As for me, I don't use their operating system because I estimate it expensive and vastly inferior to the free linux. Again, my estimate, my decision, and 90% of the computer owners don't think as I do. To each his own.

rabbitoid: ?? It's already sorted. They admitted fault, thanks to the laptop makers sending me info.

I'll get a netbook a day. I like the idea of less than 10 Watt at max.

HOW come that if you need a new discdrive you get a harddrive replaced and the discdrive NOT? Grapho-legosthenia? Companies like Siemens are DOOMED.

gogul: We call that zombies, like the UBS.

I would not normally post anything from one of my Fellowships on a public board BUT i think this is quite important

For those of you who are interested, and have young families, i think this is for you AND its from our friends at Mozilla of course, yep, those that bring you Firefox AND Thunderbird

Firefox launches Beatbullying browser - Mozilla, the corporation behind Firefox, has launched a new custom-built browser in conjunction with Beat bullying. Read up on Cyber Mentors.

I have not tried it myself, but anything that makes the web a safe place to be for children must be good

Keep up-2-date, with all the latest on PC's & Computing at Monkeys Cyber Cafe

Anyone here tell me if the HTML Document Element, BASEFONT works on Firefox, or is it not used anymore ?

MadMonkey: The basefont element was deprecated in HTML 4.01, and is not supported in XHTML 1.0 Strict DTD.
I think it's only supported by IE, though some browsers may keep some compatibility mode for it to work.
If you need to set the font throughout the document try http://www.htmlcodetutorial.com/character_famsupp_208.html

pauloaguia: Thanks, i had a feeling it was

Is Facebook really worth $6.5 billion? - Can this be because BrainKing now has a page there OR because Facebooks Russian backers agreed to pay $14.77 a share for Facebook common stock ???? I wonder lol

MadMonkey: Maybe BrainKing is worth at least 1 million Euro and we even don't know it.

Fencer:

Fencer: 2 million (dollars), actually: http://sitevaluecheck.com/

pauloaguia: hmm, according to the same site, www.microsoft.com is worth $5,637,900. Fencer, you're worth about 40% of Microsoft! retire and move to Tahiti!

rabbitoid: On my way.

When I defrag my computer, which I do at least once a week now, this is the message I get at the end:

Findings on C:

Diskeeper has completed a defragmentation run on this volume and there remain 1276 fragmented files and 3508 excess file fragments. (There were 4806 excess file fragments before the defragmentation run, and now there are 27% less.)

The average number of fragments per file is 1.03.

You should schedule Diskeeper to run considerably more often than it has been running to reduce the current fragmentation and maintain a lower level of fragmentation. This volume is moderately fragmented, with 50% of the total volume space available for defragmentation.

The number of excess and fragmented files never go down more than this - could someone tell me what's happening and what I can do?

Fencer: How about a smiley with a beach umbrella, and maybe enjoying a beverage?

Before you leave please?

Binabik: Diskeeper will almost never do a full defrag (only 1 fragment per file) because it's just not worth it.
Defrag is usefull when your disk is so fragmented that permance suffers greatly because reading large files will imply running from one sector to another half way accross the disk. However, if when you have large chunks, there comes a point when it is more time consuming to move such large chunks around than the performance gains you may get from it. If you look at that log in detail, you'll probably find out that most of the resulting fragments are large and that few files will be spread accross more than 3 or 4 fragments (except, maybe, for really big ones)

I think this is explained in greater detail in the application's help but that's the general idea.
Still, you can request a full defragmentation somewhere in the options, if I'm not mistaken...

pauloaguia: Thank you, I"ll look for the full defrag.

Binabik: Also it sounds like your hard disk maybe to full. It's best to keep a good clean portion % wise so defragging has space to work.

(V): I thought the same but then he said 50% of the total volume was available... so I don't think that's it

pauloaguia: It can then take a few consecutive defrags to fix it.

I keep mine over 60 % and defrag even when it says it's ok if it looks like it's getting bad.

(V): It doesn't matter how often I defrag, the numbers stay about the same..... and I couldn't find an option for a full defrag.

Since my computer has been a bit slow, I called AT&T to check the lines, and they found to errors on the line. Then they had me go to speedtest.net and I couldn't find the map they said was there. So then they had me switch from FF to IE, and then I saw the map and ran the speed test. Everything was as it should have been. So, I decided to use IE and see how that was - BK is a lot faster for me now as are other sites. I wonder if I should delete and then re-install FF? Any suggestions?

Binabik: ... which windows are you using? Do you use a window washer and registry cleaner??

It helps to know to try and figure out why!

Binabik: funny you should mention that has i had a similar problem last week with FF i removed it and reloaded it and its working great again now

Binabik: Do you have any plugins? Some of them tend to bloat FF a lot...

pauloaguia: Something to remember for future possibles... Cheers

Binabik: Also, remember Firefox uses a lot of RAM

pauloaguia: Yea, check your add-on's for Firefox. Yea, there are a lot of cool ones out there, but the more you have the"bigger" Firefox gets... and possible slower it will move.

Remove the ones you rarely use. Disable the ones you don't use often.

coan.net: The only add-ons I use are Fasterfox and Safescript - the latter is now driving me nuts as it's become too complicated...
Where do I go to wash the windows? I've used CCCleaner before, is that what you use for registry cleaner? Sorry, I'm mush when it comes to computer ablities....
I don't have a lot of RAM either - sigh......
Thank you all for your input!

Binabik: I have Windows XP

Well i am sure we all know what was happening 40 years ago, yep, people were walking on the moon
I get lots of great stuff from all over the web to do with computers and technology.
I got this today, that i thought i would share

Ever fancied being on that first flight to the moon ? Well, take a look at THIS little journey awesome....

There is more interesting stuff here in the Top ten stories about the moon and technology