Epocdigest V1 # 526

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Epoc Digest Sat, 22 May 2004 Volume 01 : Number 526

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Sent to: 781 subscribers

In today's Epoc Digest 11 messages:

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- Virus alert

- Re: Epoc Digest V1 # 525 (13)

- Want to Buy......

- Re: Ordering a mac laptop

- Jamie's Psion 7

- NetBook Mount,

- Backups and Macros

- Psion 7 Stuck!

- netbook Ethernet card

- screen cable repair

- Spare 5mx

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Data: 21 May 2004 10:07>00 +0100

From: Digest administrator

Subject: Virus alert

Dear Digest member,

Once again a virus is on the loose, pretending to originate from the Epoc Digest. The email address seem to come frwith the text "Important notice" and a zipped file attached "Notice.zip (21 Kb)".

The message is fake and the zip file is a virus. Let me point out again that you should NEVER open such messages. The real Epoc Digest does never carry any attachment and is always in plain text.

Best regards,Michael DegnThe Epoc Digest Team

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Date: 20 May 2004 10:18:17 +0100

From: Joop Gerritse

Subject: Re: Epoc Digest V1 # 525 (13)

On Thursday 20 May 2004 12:53, you wrote:

> WEP

> ---

> (W)ireless (E)ncryption (P)rotocol. It is similar to going on to a secure

> web site, except you must know the 128 bit cipher key in order for the page

> to view properly. It prevents access to wireless networks for those that do

> not know the key. As it is a 128 bit encryption, it can be breached using a

> brute force attack similar to those performed on encrypted or secured

> documents like zip files or Word Documents (or Windows passwords <g>). If

> the administrator was especially stupid, it may be breached even quicker

> with a dictionary attack.

IIRC, it means Wired Equivalent Protocol. That is, it is not really encrypted,

and, indeed, not very secure. Point is, it was only intended to provide

security roughly equivalent to a wired network, so your data would not lie on

the street. But first of all, it was (and is?) switched OFF by default. And

then, of course, people started relying on its "encryption". WEP2 should be

stronger, and there are other variants with better security, but none of them

really protects your communications end to end.

Joop Gerritse

Mühlenstraße 11

D-47546 Kalkar-Wissel

Germany

+49 2824 971487

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Date: 20 May 2004 12:41:27 +0100

From: Gary Jenkinson

Subject: Want to Buy......

Hi All,

Further to my earlier message to the Digest about the consequences of moving

back to using a Psion, I'm having particular difficulty in replacing,

certainly at a reasonable price anyway, a Siemens Pocket Reader scanner pen

and a Psion PC Card/Modem Adaptor.

If any of the Digestees (or Digestives as my M/$ spell-checker suggests!)

have either of these items that they'd like to sell me, please contact me

off-Digest using any of my contact details below.

Many thanks,

Gary Jenkinson

email: <mailto:garyjenkinson

garyjenkinson AT email DOT com

Tel/Fax/Ansaphone: +44 (0) 2476 361242

Mobile: +44 (0) 7771 635764

(Coventry, UK)

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Date: 20 May 2004 13:36:10 +0100

From: Terry Gordon

Subject: Re: Ordering a mac laptop

Andy: Why not go to the Apple site? They sometimes have fully refurbished computers for sale even cheaper than other sites. TG

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Date: 20 May 2004 14:03:03 +0100

From: Andy Hayes

Subject: Jamie's Psion 7

Thanks for all of the interest in my son's Psion 7. It is now sold.

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Date: 20 May 2004 16:35:30 +0100

From: Itamar Engelsman

Subject: NetBook Mount,

Answer to: Andy Hayes

Re.: NetBook Mount - I had a look at the website and am not happy with the mount. First of all it would hamper anyone with a manual car from using the gearbox. Secondly you have to really look down in order to see anything taking your eyes off the road situation completely, which could be very dangerous if something would happen in front of you. If you read the first edition of Psion Computer you would have seen my solution for cars with a flat dashboard like the BMW's. Basically it consists of two hooks which you attach to the ventilation outlet and hook onto the front of the mBook stopping it from sliding towards you and a piece of anti-slip rubber to stop it from moving in sharp turns. On rare occasions it moves but 99.9% of the time it is very steady and workable. As it was published in the magazine, I think I would need Will's permission to give further details and show the photos I attached to the article.

Best regards,

Itamar Engelsman

London, UK

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Date: 20 May 2004 18:38:22 +0100

From: Andy Hayes

Subject: Backups and Macros

Astrid asked about my need for a macro to close all open apps. I run two different backup apps each night. Chris Handley's FastBackup and EPOCBackup by FatCatz. I would like to just run FastBackup but it wont back up files on different drives at the same time as far as I can tell. There is a file that I wish to keep on C: and others that I want to remain on D:. FastBackup takes care of D:. C: is addressed by EPOCBackup.

There have been problems with these backups not being completed and I have no idea why. If I run them manually they work OK. If I run them "manually" via Crontab they work OK. Left to their own devices things fail to happen properly and I think that it might be the apps re-opening that is causing the problem. This theory is really confirmed by the fact that I run an app called Start-up at 6am and this should start up all of the files that I regularly use. Unfortunately, CronTab switches the netBook off before the apps have been opened, so when I switch the netBook on the app starts to run again.

Recently the backup appeared to have failed and when I looked at the E: drive (the repository for the backups) I found that the CF was corrupt. Fortunately, although it couldn't be read in the netBook at all, it could be read in the spare netBook, so I used EDU to chkdisk it and something was fixed then the CF was fine when put back in the original netBook.

Backups are supposed to add security to your data, but I am obviously doing them so badly that something needed to be done. I think that Wolfgang's macro is going to provide the solution that I need. The only drawback that I can see is that if Powerbase, one of my commonly open apps, does not close the time logging file that I have open nicely, I will be left with a file that does not contain the latest updates that I have made to it as Powerbase only seems to really save when the file is closed. If his macro isn't able to close it down, I have little hope that I would be able to do anything better manually other than kill the process, so it still addresses my needs.

Removing the complications for the backup apps of open files will, I am sure, add some degree of safety and value to the backup regime.

I ought to congratulate Chris publicly on the help file of FastBackup. It has improved no end in terms of understandability for the more educationally challenged of us!

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Date: 20 May 2004 18:41:39 +0100

From: robertsont

Subject: Psion 7 Stuck!

Hi all,

Here's a new one! I have a psion 7, in full working order bar the fact that at switch on all I get is the psion series 7 Logo, with EPOC Release 5 Copyright and patents pending screen.

A hard reset does not solve the problem.

Nor does resetting the machine with a CF card (with OS.img file)

Any bright ideas welcome!

Machine responds to contrast changes, screen brightness changes however I cannot get past this screen to anything that asks for the OS.img file.

Regards,

Tom

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Date: 21 May 2004 11:24:09 +0100

From: ealasaidandsimon

Subject: netbook Ethernet card

Hello, all,

The University Library here in Oxford has ethernet sockets at readers desks which allow you to connect to the net or use the online catalogues and resources. It is set up from a PC perrspective and pretty much expects you to fend for yourself. I have successfully used it with my iBook which has built in ethernet. However we are having more problems getting my wife's netBook set up to use it.

We bought on eBay a "Psion Gold Card V34 + Fax Ethernet Multi-function PC Card" however it does not seem to be working with the netbook, we keep getting "not supported" messages.

I have looked around the Psion support site and tried testing it and adjusting the settings but no luck. It does not seem to appear on the list of compatible cards, either as "compatible" or "not compatible".

There seems to be a firmware update out there for it, but this is not much use without a PC to install it?

Can anyone offer some advice on what card to get? I am pretty confident that if we can get a card that works with the netBook I will be able to configure it to work on the university network. However it is that first stage, getting a working card, that is proving difficult!

The netBook has the latest OS by the way, I can't remember the number; it works no problem on our wireless network at home.

Simon

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Date: 21 May 2004 12:40:57 +0100

From: Anthony Ross

Subject: screen cable repair

I have a 3mx with a failed screen, also a Psion 5 on which the screen cable is beginning to show early signs of failure. To get them both repaired by POS will cost about £150. One of my sons has worked in the Electronics Industry and is capable of intricate small scale soldering. Is it possible to purchase the screen cables separately and do the repair at home? Is there a web site or instructions anywhere to enable one to do this?

Any help appreciated

regards

Tony Ross

P.S. Nice to see Owen back, I missed his wit and erudition.

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Date: 21 May 2004 17:38:03 +0100

From: Ing. Michael Asteriou

Subject: Spare 5mx

Hi all!

I love my Psion! I really do! About one month ago I bought a spare 5mx for 80 Euros (only used for 2 weeks and then abandoned in favor of a Time-Manager, you know the one with PAPER :) ...

This was one of the most reasonable investments I ever made! Today my screen cable broke after 4 years of constant use and I managed to backup from my old and restore to my new Psion in about 5 minutes...I'm lovin' it!