It’s really annoying when you print out a web page, and there’s a bit chopped off down the right hand side.

This is because the standard margins for Internet Explorer are 19mm, which only allow a width of 637 pixels to be printed in portrait mode. Many web pages are a bit wider than this.

To fix it, just decrease the margins in Internet Explorer as follows:

- click on File/Page Setup
- In the margins box, change the Left and Right Margins to 5

This will allow you to print out most pages OK. If they still get chopped off, print them in landscape mode by clicking on Landscape in the page setup box.
(And if you are a web designer, why not try to make your pages “fluid” so that they’ll print out OK even with the standard IE printer settings)

The operation of the internet fundamentally changed last week, when Verisign implemented their controversial “Site Finder” service.

In the past, when you type a non-registered internet name into a browser you would get a system error message that was needed for various applications like domain checkers and SPAM filters. Now there’s no error message - you’ll be taken to an advertising site.
The implications of this are enormous - as it is a fundamental change to the way the internet operates.

Several lawsuits have already been filed over this abuse of Verisign’s powers. (They expect to earn several hundred million dollars a year from your mis-typed domain names)
See http://news.com.com/2100-1038_3-5083161.html?tag=mainstry for more info.

United Kingdom phone company Phones 4U has banned internal emails between staff because their CEO believes that that each employee wastes 3 hours a day reading and answering them.
They’ve been told to talk to other staff in person, or use the phone. Apparently productivity has increased significantly. Read Article.

Hmmm - Phone company gets employees to use phone instead of email - gets worldwide publicity!
Nice PR work!

The best source of information about anything to do with broadband in Australia is at Whirlpool.net.au.

Scroll down the home page for recent news and comment.
The ‘BROADBAND CHOICE” link takes you to a list of providers in your state.
The “DISCUSSION FORUM” link goes to a lively user forum.

If you are having problems with your broadband connection, pay a visit to www.ozcableguy.com for lots of practical advice.

You can now try out LINUX on your desktop computer without affecting your current operating system in any way.

The October 2003 APC (mentioned below) also has a CD-ROM with a bootable version of Lindows 4.0, an extremely user friendly version of Unix.

After a couple of minutes bootup time on a 1ghz Celeron, it had configured itself and was up and running. All system devices were setup properly without any manual intervention.

Internet connections through our router happened immediately, and web browsing was a LOT faster than in Windows.

Unix type operating systems have always been the preferred option for servers, and are now starting to become viable for desktop use. It’s cheap, and is immune from many of the worms, viruses, and other problems that plague Windows users. The Lindows distribution is very user friendly, and their “Click and Run” warehouse contains a wide range of free, easily installed software.

Unix may not be for everyone, but the prospect of saving one to two thousand dollars per computer on the Operating system and basic software is one of the motivating factors in the increasing acceptance of Unix variants onto the Desktop.

And it’s going to be more common than ever soon, because a free Lindows operating system will soon be on every new Seagate hard disk.

What would it take for You to switch away from Windows on your desktop?
Click on the link below, and leave your comments.

If you don’t want to spend many hundreds of dollars for a Word Processor, Spreadsheet, and other essential programs we suggest that you take a look at Open Office.

This is a free suite of programs that are compatible with Microsoft Word, Excel, Powerpoint, etc. You can exchange documents with users of Microsoft programs, and everyone will be able to read and write the documents that are created.

Version 1.1 of these programs has recently been released. More info at OpenOffice.org

(*** Save hours of downloading if you are on a modem. The October 2003 edition of Australian Personal computer contains the Open Office suite on CD ROM. There are also many other useful programs and upgrades on the disks. )

“Aoccdrnig to rscheearch dnoe at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, the oredr of letetrs in a wrod dosen’t mttaer, the olny thnig thta’s iopmrantt is that the
frsit and lsat ltteer of eevry word is in the crcreot ptoision. The
rset can be jmbueld and one is stlil able to raed the txet wiohtut
dclftfuiiy. “

If you think you’ve been getting more SPAM in your mailbox lately, you’re right.
In June 2003, Network World determined that 69% of email sent was SPAM - (up from 50% from a similar test in February)

This is confirmed with live monitoring done by Postini, one of the world’s largest SPAM filtering companies who currently show a rate of 72.8% SPAM.

In an effort to manage junk mail, I’ve tried out a number of solutions with varying results.
For a month, I switched my entire email system to the new version of Mozilla which incorporated a “learning mode” SPAM trap. This was fairly effective, but try as I might, it could not learn to junk all messages that had anything to do with Viagra.

SPAM ASSASSIN (as supplied on our hosting accounts) still was pretty effective, but as it operates on a set of defined “rules”, fine tuning the individual settings to suit your purposes is fiddly and time consuming.

I’m currently using Eudora 6, whose new Bayesian SPAM filtering engine works like a charm. As soon as it was installed, it correctly selected over 80% of SPAM messages.

After a few days of simply “telling” it a bit more about what I considered to be SPAM, my inbox is virtually SPAM-free. In the past 4 days, only 12 out of 638 SPAM messages actually made it to my inbox. The rest were silently diverted to a “junk” folder where they could be reviewed.

The “JUNK” folder contained about 15 newsletters and other messages that I wanted to keep, so I just marked these as “Not Junk”. Eudora will remember this s for next time.

Eudora 6 contains the easiest to use, most effective SPAM tool that I have ever seen. I had to pay $US39.95 to upgrade to the latest paid version, but the time saved by its effective SPAM control makes it a great investment.

I must admit that I am biased towards Eudora - I’ve been using it for several years because it is fast, powerful, and is unaffected by all of the viruses that are specially written to wreak havoc on Microsoft Outlook users.

There are similar SPAM detecting add ons available for Microsoft Outlook. One that has won many awards is available at www.inboxer.com costs$US24.95, but there is a free 21 day trial.

Another alternative is for WebAngel to divert all server mail through a very effective commercial filtering system. This would add a few dollars a month to the cost of a hosting account. would you be prepared to pay this to free your inbox from around 95% of SPAM? Please leave your comments by clicking on the link under this post.

Regards,
WebAngel.

Hello,

Some Telstra users are experiencing errors when trying to connect to websites on our systems. You may also be having problems when checking your email. These problems are caused by faulty network connections between your computer and our mailserver.

We’ve prepared a step by step HOWTO guide that should fix the problem.
It’s at webangel.com.au/howto/removelock.htm

This is only a workaround, and we look forward to Telstra fixing the problems with their systems so that your mail connections will be reliable again.

Users of other ISP’s are having no difficulty in reaching our websites or email accounts.

Please see the post below for more information about the problems being experienced by Telstra users Australia wide.
Telstra are saying that the problem is nothing to do with them, and that the problem is with the web host (ie WebAngel) This is not true, and you can easily check by asking someone on a non Telstra ISP to access your website.
Any queries? - send an email.

WebAngel.
admin@webangel.com.au

Are you on a Telstra connection?
Have you been having problems accessing your website and email?

If so, please let us know so that we can get some idea of the effect that this problem is having on our clients. (Just click on the comments button under this post)

For the last couple of weeks, the Telstra network has been experiencing connectivity problems, as documented by people all around australia on the Whirlpool.net.au broadband forums
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=109054

It has been estimated that around 400,000 sites are unavailable via the Telstra network, including high profile international ones like www.excite.com and www.linuxtoday.com

Here at WebAngel we have had many calls from Telstra users asking whether our systems are down.
They aren’t, and if you try to reach them from a non Telstra network then you won’t have any problems.

Telstra support don’t seem to be of much help, as discussed in this Whirlpool posting.
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=109840
However, we’d recommend that you try to make a complaint anyway.

There’s nothing we at WebAngel can do to fix this problem. Our equipment is fully operational, and can be accessed without problems from a non Telstra ISP.

If you are affected by these problems, we suggest you obtain a backup dialup connection with another ISP - (we use and recommend iprimus.com.au - who have plans available from $5 per month - ideal as a backup)

We’ve just about had enough of ADSL problems over the last couple of weeks - and will be moving to an alternative broadband provider ASAP.

Regards,
EG.

Welcome to our WebLog - you’ll find up to date information and advice about good stuff and bad stuff that affects internet users.

This could be warnings about a new worm or virus, advice about email fraud attempts, or a note about a great resource that will make your internet life easier or maybe give you a good laugh.

It will be easy to find what you want - We’ll put messages into several categories so you can easily find what you want.

This weblog will be used for short, topical items and news. More detailed articles on various topics will still be published on our main website at webangel.com.au

This WebLog is not located on the main WebAngel systems, and can also be accessed at webangel.blogs.com This is so that it can be used as an emergency means of communication if our main site becomes unavailable for any reason. (According to Murphy’s Law, if we make arrangements for such a problem, it will never happen )

Tell us what you think. Just click on the comment link below or send us an email

Regards,
Eric Graudins
WebAngel Pty. Ltd.

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Disclaimer: All information in this weblog is provided in good faith.
WebAngel Pty. Ltd. or its employees will not be held responsible for anything that happens as a result of you following, or not following any of the information and advice provided here.
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