program

Have you ever sent an email to someone and wondered if your message was opened by the recipient? Yesterday, Infopackets Reader Brian 'BigJohn2' asked if I knew of a program which could do just that. After some prodding and poking around Google, I ... came across a program called MsgTag [Message Tag]. In a nutshell, MsgTag works by injecting a traceable object into outgoing emails. When the message is opened by the recipient, MsgTag alerts the sender with an email receipt that the message has been read. As I discussed briefly in yesterday's article, there are 3 different flavors of Message Tag. I ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Brian 'BigJohn2' writes: " A year ago (maybe longer), I downloaded a freeware program from the web that allowed me to know when my emails were received by the recipient. I have since run into some complications with my computer ... system, had to reformat my entire hard drive, and wasn't able to save any of my downloaded utility programs. The real bummer is that I've completely forgotten the name of this tracking program and am unable to reference it on the web. Are you aware of such a program? " My response: After fumbling through Google for an answer, I came across ... (view more)

All is not well in the land of infopackets.com. During the last newsletter announcement, the infopackets web server crashed. My laptop was connected to the infopackets server at the time that it happened and I was able to see that server's virtual ... memory (swap file) was almost completely depleted. In techy terms, this situation is referred to as a memory leak. How a Memory Leak causes an Operating System to crash An operating system is reserved a specific set of system memory (RAM) to perform critical system operations. By definition, it is the job of the operating system to ensure that a ... (view more)

Can Digital Steganography be used with good intent? Recall -- Last week, I wrote 2 articles on Digital Steganography (pronounced "Stay-Gan-Aw-Gra-Fee"). By definition, Steganography is simply the art of hiding plain data from sight. In the same ... respect, Digital Steganography is the ability to hide a file inside of another file, called the "carrier file". Both articles focused on a question sent in from Infopackets Reader John B., who proposed the question, "If I downloaded a jpeg image file from the Internet, and it has a virus hidden inside ... [can the virus execute ... (view more)

Donna H. writes: " I have windows 2000 / NT. My administrative password timed out or somehow expired, and now I can't use any of the Administration computer management. How can I reset my Admin password? Thank you for reading this and any help is ... appreciated. " My response: I visited win2000mag.net and found instructions on how to use a program called Ntpasswd. The instructions given below are essentially verbatim, but have been changed slightly to "newbie speak" so it is easier to follow. http://www.win2000mag.net You can use Peter Nordahl's Ntpasswd tool to reset the ... (view more)

Have you ever turned your computer speakers loud enough to hear some of your favorite .MP3s in another room -- only to come rushing back to your computer to turn the volume down because the next song playing is just too loud? That's what happened to ... me today. And with that in mind, I pondered whether or not there existed a freeware program that could normalize the volume of all my MP3s. As usual, I headed over to Google for the answer. I searched for "freeware mp3 normalize" and managed to find a fantastic little program called MP3Gain. From the Webattack.com web site: " ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader 'BluzzOne' writes: " How do you remove Kazza? It seems impossible to uninstall. I have ad-aware 6 which removed the Spyware associated with Kazaa, and it no longer runs. I think Kazaa needs the adware in order to function. " My ... response: You are correct: Kazaa will not run without the Spyware (adware) attached, which is why so many users prefer to use Kazaa Lite -- it doesn't come bundled with parasite code. The Add / Remove Programs in Control Panel should remove Kazaa from your computer, although I'm not sure what happens to the uninstall program if you use a ... (view more)

Side note: I was late getting back from a Holiday this past Tuesday (Canadian Thanksgiving) and was unable to send out Tuesday's edition of the Gazette on time. Without further adieu, please enjoy this "late" edition! Infopackets Reader Ali V. ... writes: " Good morning! Firstly I'd like to I've found your newsletter very helpful in the past and have downloaded thins that have been suggested, so thank you. I wonder if you could help me with a problem I am having. I use Windows 98, BT Open World (my Internet Service Provider), and I am having a real problem opening attachments in ... (view more)

As per our recent conversations on .DLL Hell (Dynamic Link Libraries), I've dedicated the following Feature Article review and Visitor Feedback sections to further enhance the discussion. If you like reading about the true workings of a computer ... with respect to software and the operating system (I.E. Windows), you'll definitely enjoy this edition of the Gazette, written in Simple English. There's lots of great learning stuff in this article, so stay tuned! -- Have you ever experienced an application or game that ran sluggish -- and wished there was something that you could do to "make it ... (view more)