PC Tips Box » Internet

Google Plugin Enables Chrome to Run Inside IE

Jason — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 08:08:33 +0000

A lot of people hate Internet Explorer 6 and for good reason. Developers don’t like it because making their projects work on the aging browser with all its quirks eats up precious time and users don’t like it because of its severe lack of features and poor performance. But for many upgrading isn’t an option and many businesses still rely on the browser launched in 2001. But now there is an alternative; with a plugin users will get all of the benefits of a modern browser while still running IE and the best part is that it took Google to make this happen.

“Today, we’re releasing an early version of Google Chrome Frame, an open source plug-in that brings HTML5 and other open web technologies to Internet Explorer,” software engineers Amit Joshi and Alex Russell and product manager Mike Smith wrote. “We’re building Google Chrome Frame to help web developers deliver faster, richer applications like Google Wave. Recent JavaScript performance improvements and the emergence of HTML5 have enabled web applications to do things that could previously only be done by desktop software. One challenge developers face in using these new technologies is that they are not yet supported by Internet Explorer.”

With the Google Chrome Frame, users will actually be running Chrome inside Internet Explorer, taking advantage of the latest version of the Webkit rendering engine and Google’s speedy V8 JavaScript engine. This makes a significant difference for the users as, finally, they’ll be able to view the websites in a standards compliant browser that will render them like they are supposed to be rendered, and they’ll also notice a significant speed bump especially in JavaScript heavy applications, like most of Google’s products. And, while it was designed with IE 6 users in mind, the plugin is actually available for all Internet Explorer versions.

But, apart from the improved performance, the new plugin will enable users to enjoy some of the latest web technologies, like the ones from the proposed HTML 5 standard, which most modern browsers – Firefox, Chrome, Safari – already support but towards which Microsoft has been very reluctant. The plugin itself will be a 500 KB download after which it will download an additional 10 MB or so of data. The Webkit rendering engine and V8 are straight from the developers channel so IE users will actually be running newer and faster versions than Chrome beta or stable users. And, because Chrome was designed to be as lightweight as possible, the performance penalty of running two browsers at the same time should be offset.

Google Chrome Frame for Internet Explorer is available for download here.

Tags: Browser, download, Explorer, Fast, Firefox, google, Google Chrome, Internet, internet explorer, Java, Performance, plugin, poor performance, speed

Control ill-behaved apps with DEP in IE

Jason — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 11:57:31 +0000

Internet Explorer 8 includes a security feature that shuts down misbehaving applications before they can harm your system.

This capability, known as Data Execution Prevention (DEP), runs by default when IE 8 is installed on XP SP3 and Vista SP1 or later, but it may not always be clear to you why DEP has put the brakes on one of your PC’s applications.

DEP is the best reason I know for updating to Internet Explorer 8 and Vista SP1. For many years, Microsoft has included DEP which is also called No-Execute (NX) only in parts of Windows. For example, DEP is available in IE 7 but is off by default to avoid conflicts with old, incompatible programs.

DEP is now a key part of Vista and Internet Explorer 8. When I try to install older software on newer machines, I must configure Data Execution Prevention to allow the software installer to run with DEP disabled.

To open the Data Execution Prevention dialog in XP, open Control Panel, choose System, and then select the Advanced tab. Click the Settings button in the Performance section and select the Data Execution Prevention tab. In Vista, choose Performance Information and Tools, click Advanced Tools in the left pane, select Adjust the appearance and performance of Windows, and click the Data Execution Prevention tab.

For instance, when I install QuickBooks 2007 on Windows Server 2008, I have to exclude under the DEP tab the QuickBooks updating tool in order to install it on the server.

Keep in mind that the only reason I’m doing so is because I trust Intuit, the publisher of QuickBooks. If I didn’t change the settings, DEP would prevent me from installing an older version of this software on the newer system.

If I didn’t already trust the vendor, I’d look for valid reasons why DEP was blocking the installation before I took the step of changing any DEP settings. In most instances, good, up-to-date software shouldn’t need to be excluded from DEP.

DEP helps block malware in Internet Explorer

Since IE 7, Microsoft has used DEP to help thwart online attacks in the browser itself. What the company didn’t do until IE 8, though, was to enable DEP by default.

Prior to IE 8, DEP was disabled by default for compatibility reasons, as documented on the IE blog. Many older IE add-ons were built using earlier versions of the Active Template Libraries (ATL). They aren’t compatible with DEP, therefore, and crash when IE loads them.

When DEP is enabled and combined with Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR), IE’s ability to protect against Web-based attacks improves considerably. In a nutshell, ASLR is designed to make it harder for automatic attacks to occur. You can read more about ASLR in the MSDN blog.

Specifically, ASLR helps prevent exploits both in IE and in any add-ons that are loaded. Even with the new security protections in IE 7 and 8, the browser is still targeted more often by malware authors than other browsers. This has caused security pundits to state, as Wired’s Brian X. Chen does on the Gadget Lab blog, that Apple’s new Snow Leopard operating system is “less secure than Windows, but safer.”

(If you use Snow Leopard, I encourage you to update your system to OS X version 10.6.1. This includes a patch for the insecure Adobe Flash Player that Snow Leopard shipped with, as documented in an Apple security update.)

There are many protections built into Internet Explorer 8 that may be considered just another annoying browser crash when seen in action.

Unfortunately, it’s not always obvious that IE is actually protecting you when in fact it is

Tags: appearance, Browser, compatibility, Compatible, control panel, DEP, ie, ie 7, IE8, Internet, internet explorer, internet explorer 8, Microsoft, Performance, security update, Windows

Search Syntax basics and advanced tricks for Google

Jason — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 23:34:19 +0000

Here are some search syntax basics and advanced tricks for Google.com. You might know most of these, but if you spot a new one, it may come in handy in future searches.

• A quote/ phrase search can be written with both quotations ["like this"] as well as a minus in-between words, [like-this].

• Google didn’t always understand certain special characters like [#], but now they do; a search for [C#], for example, yields meaningful results (a few years ago, it didn’t). This doesn’t mean you can use just any character; e.g. entering [t.] and [t-] and [t^] will always return the same results.

• Google allows 32 words within the search query (some years ago, only up to 10 were used, and Google ignored subsequent words). You rarely will need so many words in a single query – [just thinking of such a long query is a hard thing to do, as this query with twenty words shows] – however, it can come in handy for advanced searching… especially as a developer using the Google API.

• You can find synonyms of words. E.g. when you search for [house] but you want to find “home” too, search for [~house]. To get to know which synonyms the Google database stores for individual words, simply use the minus operator to exclude synonym after synonym (they will always show as bold in the SERPs, the search engine result pages). Like this: [~house -house -home -housing -floor].

• To see a really large page-count (possibly, the Google index size, though one can only speculate about that), search for [* *].

• Google has a lesser known “numrange” operator which can be helpful. Using e.g. [2000..2005] (that’s two dots inbetween two numbers) will find 2000, 2001, 2002 and so on until 2005.

• Google’s define-operator allows you to look up word definitions. For example, [define:css] yields “Short for Cascading Style Sheets” and many more explanations. You can trigger a somewhat “softer” version of the define-operator by entering “what is something”, e.g. [what is css].

• Google has some exciting back-end AI to allow you to find just the facts upong entering simple questions or phrases like [when was Einstein born?] or [einstein birthday] (the answer to both of these queries is “Albert Einstein – Date of Birth: 14 March 1879”). This feature was introduced April this year and is called Google Q&A. (See some of the various working Q&A sample queries to get a feeling for what’s possible.)

• Google allows you to find backlinks by using the link-operator, e.g. [link:blog.outer-court.com] for this blog. The new Google Blog Search supports this operator as well. In fact, when Google’s predecessor started out as Larry Page’s “BackRub” in the 1990s, finding backlinks was its only aim! However, not all backlinks are shown in Google today, at least not in web search. (It’s argued that Google does this on purpose to prevent reverse-engineering of its PageRank algorithm.)

• Often when you enter a question mark at the end of the query, like when you type [why?], Google will advertise its pay-for-answer service Google Answers.

• There a “sport” called Google Hacking. Basically, curious people try to find unsecure sites by entering specific, revealing phrases. A special web site called the Google Hacking Database is dedicated to listing these special queries.

• Google searches for all of your words, whether or not you write a “+” before them (I often see people write queries [+like +this], but it’s not necessary). Unless, of course, you use Google’s or-operator. It’s an upper-case [OR] (lower-case won’t work and is simply searching for occurrences of the word “or”), and you can also use parentheses and the “|” character. [Hamlet (pizza | coke)] will find pages containing the word (or being linked to with the word) “Hamlet” and additionally containing at least one of the two other words, “pizza” or “coke”.

• Not all Google services support the same syntax. Some services don’t allow everything Google web search allows you to enter (or at least, it won’t have any effect), and sometimes, you can even enter more than in web search (e.g. [insubject:test] in Google Groups). The easiest thing to find out about these operators is to simply use the advanced search and then check what ends up being written in the input box.

• Sometimes, Google seems to understand “natural language” queries and shows you so-called “onebox” results. This happens for example when you enter [goog], [weather new york, ny], [new york ny] or [war of the worlds] (for this one, movie times, move rating and other information will show).

• Not all Googles are the same! Depending on your location, Google will forward you to a different country-specific version of Google with potentially different results to the same query. A search for [site:stormfront.org] from the US will yield hundreds of thousands of results, whereas the same search from Germany (at least if you don’t change the default redirect to Google.de) returns… zilch. Yes, Google does at times agree to country-specific censorship, like in Germany, France (Google web search), or China (Google News).

• Sometimes, Google warns you about its results, especially when they might seem like promoting hate sites (of course, only someone misunderstanding how Google works could think it’s them promoting hate sites). Enter [jew], and you will see a Google-sponsored link titled “Offensive Search Results” leading to this explanation.

• For some search queries, Google uses its own ads to offer jobs. Try entering [work at Google] and take a look at the right-hand advertisement titled e.g. “Work at Google Europe” (it turns out, at the moment, Google Switzerland is hiring).

• For some of the more popular “Googlebombed” results, like when you enter [failure] and the first hit is the biography of George W. Bush, Google displays explanatory ads titled “Why these results?”.

• While Google doesn’t do real Natural Language Processing yet, this is the ultimate goal for them and other search engines. A little What-If Video [WMV] illustrates how this could be useful in the future.

• Some say that whoever turns up first for the search query [president of the internet] is, well, the President of the internet. (I’m applying as well, and you can feel free to support me with this logo.)

• Google doesn’t have “stop words” anymore. Stop words traditionally are words like [the], [or] and similar which search engines tended to ignore. Sometimes, when you enter e.g. [to be or not to be], Google even decides to show some phrase search results in the middle of the page (separated by a line and information that these are phrase search results).

• There once was an easter-egg in the Google Calculator that made Google show “42” when you entered [The Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything]. As I’ve been alerted in the forum, the easter egg only works lower-case.

• You can use the wildcard operator in phrases. This is helpful for finding song texts – let’s say you forgot a word or two, but you remember the gist, as in ["love you twice as much * oh love * *"] – and similar tasks.

• You can use the wildcard character without searching for anything specific at all, as in this phrase search: ["* * * * * * *"].

• Even though www.google.com is nothing but a “typosquatter” (someone reserving a domain name containing a popular misspelling) and search queries return very different results than Google, the site is still getting paid by Google – because it uses Google AdSense.

• If you feel like restricting your search to university servers, you can write e.g. [c-tutorial site:.edu] to only search on the “edu” domain (you can also use Google Scholar). This works for country-domains like “de” or “it” as well.

Tags: google, google search, Internet, Links, search, search result, Support, synonym, syntax, tricks, Tutorial

Quicker WEP Crack

Jason — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 08:04:24 +0000

I don’t want to make you any more paranoid about PC security than you already are (and yes, they are out to get you), but a report in Engadget suggests that a pair of Japanese students can hack WPA encryption, used on most Wi-Fi enabled devices, in around a minute. They have come up with a fancy new algorithm that, for the moment at least they’re keeping to themselves. It beats the previous record by some 10 – 15 minutes, making it a potential threat to Wi-Fi users. Details of the crack are due to be announced next month at a conference in Hiroshima, so it’s not in the wild yet, and even if it does escape, most users can protect their files by switching their WEP to AES (Advanced Encryption System) mode, or using the (so far) still secure WPA 2 system.

Tags: encrypt, encryption, hack, pc security, Security, Switching, wep, Wi-Fi, wpa

64-bit Google Chrome for Windows

Jason — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:25:13 +0000

Google is hard at work developing a 64-bit version of its open-source browser for Windows. The Mountain View-search giant indicated that work was in progress but delivered no specific availability deadline so far. According to Chromium developers Mads Sig Ager, a 64-bit (x64) flavor of Google Chrome will be offered to Windows users “soon.” There’s no telling just what the period of time “soon” can be translated into, but testers can already run 64-bit Chrome.

At the end of the past week, Google offered the first downloads of its true 64-bit version of Chrome, tailored to the Linux open-source platform. The Mountain View is focusing on adapting x64 Chrome to Linux and Mac OS X first, and only afterwards to Windows. According to Google, the heavy lifting is focused on porting the underlining V8 JavaScript engine to 64-bit platforms.

“V8 does not yet compile in 64-bit mode on Windows. We have focused on making the 64-bit version of V8 work on Linux and Mac at first. We are currently working on making the 64-bit version compile on Windows as well. We should hopefully have that done soon,” Ager stated when x64 Chrome for Linux was launched.

Google is currently offering multiple releases of Chrome for Windows, including Chrome 4.0.202.0 through the developer channel, Build 3.0.195.6 via the Beta channel, and 2.0.172.43, the stable version. Microsoft is already offering a 64-bit version of Internet Explorer, but operating systems such as Windows 7 64-bit are still pushing the 32-bit (x86) flavor of IE8 to the front as the default browser, with the x64 variant tucked away out of sight.

Users test driving 64-bit Chrome for Linux need to know that development has so far not been about performance. “We have focused on making the 64-bit version complete, so there is still some performance tuning to be done. Currently, the performance of the 64-bit version is pretty close to the performance of the 32-bit version when Chrome 2 stable was released,” Ager added.

The latest release of Google Chrome for Windows is available for download here.

The true 64-bit version of Google Chrome can be tested on Ubuntu 8.04, 8.10, 9.04 and 9.10 from here.

Tags: 64-bit, Browse, Browser, Chromium, download, google, Google Chrome, Internet, Linux, Microsoft, Performance, Software, ubuntu, Windows

IE8 RTW

Jason — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 11:09:05 +0000

Microsoft is pushing forward with the availability process of Internet Explorer 8, with a new wave of downloads scheduled to hit today, August 25th, 2009. The Redmond company announced since the end of June 2009 that it would start serving IE8 RTW to business users by the end of August, and the bits come right on schedule. The gold build of Internet Explorer 8 will be offered to all companies leveraging the software giant’s update server distribution solution designed to help administrators manage Microsoft Update releases across corporate networks.

“Starting Tuesday August 25, 2009, Internet Explorer 8 will be made available as “update rollups” via WSUS (Windows Server Update Services). This is critical for customers who manage their desktops via WSUS; they need to be aware of these updates and make necessary preparation to insure there are no unintended upgrades to Internet Explorer 8 on their desktops,” revealed Kevin Dean, Microsoft technology specialist, Education.

Ahead of August 25, WSUS admins had the option to disable auto-approve for “Update rollup” packages in Windows Server Update Services. In such scenarios, IE8 would only be offered to machines across a network after the updates were manually approved by the administrator. Business users and admins should be aware that even in the context in which Auto-Approve for “Update rollup” is enabled, the IE8 EULA still has to receive manual approval before the browser is installed on all downstream clients.

But seeing as August 25, is already here, admins will need to perform a synchronization of their WSUS server and block IE8 Update rollup packages. The auto update for “Update rollups” setting can be re-enabled afterwards.

“On default installations of SBS, this will not be automatically approved for installation. You will need to manually approve it in the SBS Console or the WSUS Console. However, if you are automatically approving Update Rollups by manually configuring WSUS, then it is important for you to know that the IE 8 Installation Blocker Tool used to block Automatic Update deployments to your machines will not block WSUS deployments of IE 8,” explained a member of the Microsoft Small Business Server (SBS) team.

IE8 was released to web in March 2009, but as the needs of business users differ from those of end users, Microsoft is only offering the browser through WSUS almost half a year later. And chances are that corporations are still not ready to embrace IE8 and will in fact wish to dodge the WSUS IE8 RTW Update rollups.

Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) RTW is available for download list:

vista x86
vista x64
xp x86
xp x64

Tags: Browse, Downloads, Explorer, ie, IE8, Internet, internet explorer, internet explorer 8, Microsoft Update, RTW, WSUS

Create an Ad Hoc Wireless Network

Jason — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 07:26:29 +0000

If you want to share information stored on your computer with other people nearby and everyone’s computer has a wireless network adapter, a simple method of sharing is to set up an ad hoc wireless network. In spite of the fact that members must be within 30 feet of each other, this type of network presents a lot of possibilities. For example, you might consider establishing an ad hoc network at a meeting of mobile computer users so that you can share information with other attendees on their own screens rather than an overhead projector. (After establishing the network, you can do this by using Windows Meeting, for instance.)

Ad hoc networks are by definition temporary; they cease to exist when members disconnect from them, or when the computer from which the network was established moves beyond the 30-foot effective range of the others. You can share an Internet connection through an ad hoc network, but keep in mind that the Internet connection is then available to anyone logging on to a computer that is connected to the network, and thus is likely not very secure.

To set up an ad hoc network:

1. On the Start menu, click Connect To.

2. In the Connect to a network window, click the Set up a connection or network task.

3. On the Choose a connection option page, click Set up a wireless ad hoc (computer-to-computer) network, and then click Next. (This option only appears on computers that have wireless adapters.)

4. Read the ad hoc network information, and then click Next.

5. Provide a network name, select whether the network is open or requires authentication, provide a security phrase if necessary, and then click Next.

After Windows Vista sets up the ad hoc network, you have the option of sharing your Internet connection.

To disconnect from an ad hoc network, display the Connect To A Network window, click the ad hoc network, and then click Disconnect.

Tags: ad hoc networks, Computer, computer network, connection, Internet, internet connection, Mobile, mobile computer users, Security, Windows, windows vista, Wireless, wireless adapters, wireless network adapter

Gmail flaw shows value of strong passwords

Jason — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 10:20:48 +0000

The disclosure of a back door allowing bad guys to repeatedly guess Gmail passwords should remind us all to protect our accounts with long and strong character strings.

There’s a straightforward way to protect your online accounts use signin phrases that are easy for you to remember but hard for others to guess.

The latest vulnerability affecting Gmail accounts was recently revealed by security researcher Vicente Aguilera Díaz in a posting on the Full Disclosure security list. (Aguilera previously revealed a Gmail flaw known as session-riding, which Google subsequently fixed, as reported by WS contributing editor Scott Spanbauer)

According to Aguilera’s new security alert, Google allows anyone with a Gmail account to guess another Gmail user’s password 100 times every two hours, or 1,200 times per day. No “captcha” keeps hacker bots from guessing passwords in this way. Worst of all: If a hacker controls, say, 100 Gmail accounts, 120,000 guesses can be made per day. Because Gmail accounts are free, many hackers control far more than 100 accounts, of course.

To its credit, Gmail requires fairly long passwords of 8 characters or more. However, as Aguilera points out, Gmail allows users to create extremely weak passwords such as aaaaaaaa.

A quick survey of my friends and relatives revealed that not one of them uses strong passwords. Most people have no idea how to create them. Yet everyone I asked expressed guilt at using easy-to-crack passwords: pet names, birthdays, and common dictionary words.

Most people’s passwords could be guessed in far fewer than 10,000 attempts. And, despite using weak passwords, the people I interviewed say they rarely change their signin strings. (One-third of the people surveyed use the same password for every Web site they sign in to, and the infamous Conficker worm needed to try only 200 common passwords to break into many systems, according to an analysis by the Sophos security firm.)

Here’s the topper: many respondents to my informal survey admitted to keeping an unencrypted file on their systems that lists every password they use!

You may not think the password to your webmail account is valuable. But anyone with access to your account can use it to send spam and ruin your online reputation. More seriously, you may have entered the same password at an online banking site, such as PayPal, or a site where your credit-card number is stored for easy ordering, such as Amazon.

Tags: account, crack, encrypt, fix, gmail, gmail account, google, hack, hacker, hackers, how to, mail, password, passwords, Security, spam, Web, webmail, webmail account, worm

IE8 slow?

Jason — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 10:58:54 +0000

If you’re experiencing problems with IE8 being slow to load pages, especially when multiple tabs are involved, this might be worth a try. Because this tweak is simply registering a DLL that should have been registered as part of the IE8 installation, there is no harm that can come from trying this.

Here are the instructions.

FOR WINDOWS XP

1. Click Start, then click Run.

2. In the Run dialog box, type cmd and press Enter.

3. In the Command Prompt window, enter this text and press Enter:

regsvr32 actxprxy.dll

4. Restart your computer.

FOR WINDOWS VISTA/WINDOWS 7

1. Type cmd in the Start menu Search box.

2. Right-click the Cmd shortcut that appears at the top of the search results list, Under Programs, as shown here.

3. Choose Run As Administrator.

4. In the Command Prompt window, enter this text and press Enter:

regsvr32 actxprxy.dll

5. Restart your computer.

If this works for you, let me know in the comments below…

Tags: cmd, dll, IE8, Internet, internet explorer, internet explorer 8, problems, Prompt, Register, registering a dll, restart, tweak, Windows 7, windows vista, windows xp

IE8 Compatibility View List Update for all Windows

Jason — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 09:44:03 +0000

The latest release of the Compatibility View list update for Internet Explorer 8 went live earlier this week and is now available for download. In an effort to maintain compatibility between IE8 and website developers for IE6 and IE7, Microsoft introduced the Compatibility View feature in the browser.

The Redmond-based company also maintains a list of websites that fail to play nice with the gold version of Internet Explorer 8. For this specific content, IE8 doesn’t use the latest version of its rendering engine, tailored to modern web standards, but rather behaves like older releases of the browser.

“An update for the Windows Internet Explorer 8 Compatibility View list that is dated June 23, 2009, is available. This Compatibility View list update makes Web sites that are designed for older browsers look better in Internet Explorer 8. When you install Internet Explorer 8, you can decide whether the sites that you browse should be displayed in Compatibility View. After you install this update, you may have to restart Internet Explorer,” Microsoft informed.

The software giant is offering the refresh for IE8 running on top of Windows 7 Release Candidate, Windows Vista RTM/SP1/SP2 and Windows XP including SP3. In order to take advantage of this update, IE8 users need to access the browser’s Compatibility View Settings, and must select the “Include updated website lists from Microsoft” option. Internet Explorer 8 was released to web in mid-March 2009. At this point in time, the company is collecting feedback from end users for the next iteration of IE.

“Sites that appear in the Compatibility View list are sites for which other users have clicked the Compatibility View button. This list is updated automatically and helps users have a better experience with Web sites that are not yet updated for Internet Explorer 8,” the software giant stated.

- Update for Internet Explorer 8 Compatibility View List for Windows XP (KB971930)
- Update for Internet Explorer 8 Compatibility View List for Windows XP x64 Edition (KB971930)
- Update for Internet Explorer 8 Compatibility View List for Windows 7 Release Candidate for x64-based Systems (KB971930)
- Update for Internet Explorer 8 Compatibility View List for Windows 7 Release Candidate (KB971930)
- Update for Internet Explorer 8 Compatibility View List for Windows Vista (KB971930)
- Update for Internet Explorer 8 Compatibility View List for Windows Vista x64 Edition (KB971930)

Tags: compatibility, download, experience, Explorer, ie, IE6, ie7, IE8, Internet, internet explorer, internet explorer 8, update

PC Tips Box » Internet

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