The Energy Policy Act of 2005 is coming home to roost. It extends day saving time by an additional four weeks, starting next month. DST begins no March 11 this year (three weeks early) and will end a week later on the first Sunday of November.

What that means to people is that we'll have to "spring forward" and lose an hour of sleep a little sooner, but in return we'll have an extra month of later sunsets. But what does it mean to computers?

After the huge build-up to Y2K that fizzled, IT folks are wary of issuing too many dire warnings this time. But some applications that are time critical may experience problems.

Vista users don't have to fret as far as the OS is concerned; it's already updated to handle the early DST. If you're running XP SP2, there's an update available. There's also an update for Windows 2000 under Extended Hotfix Support.  XP SP1, NT and other operating systems that are no longer officially supported by Microsoft don't have updates -- however, you can manually update all versions of Windows using the tzedit.exe utility or following the instructions in KB article 914387 at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/914387.

And it's not just the OS that may need updating. No update is required for Outlook 2007, but for older versions of Outlook you'll need to run the Outlook Time Zone Data Update tool. You can read more about this in KB article 931667 at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/931667/en-us.

Likewise, Exchange Server 2007 doesn't have to be updated, but earlier versions do. Some other server services and developer tools, such as SharePoint, Office Live Meeting and Visual Studio, also need attention. For a full discussion of how to prepare for DST with Microsoft products, see http://support.microsoft.com/gp/dst_topissues

Finally, don't forget your mobile devices (PDAs and smart phones). An update for Windows Mobile smartphones is available at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=7074664E-827C-477C-A59F-A6103AABA3B1&displaylang=en

Springing forward this year may be a little more complicated than usual, but as long as you prepare for it, it shouldn't be the catastrophic event that a few are predicting.

deb@shinder.net    www.debshinder.com

Tom and I will be attending the MVP Summit in Seattle and Redmond again this year; it's scheduled for March 12-15. I'll be blogging about it (as much as I can; some material presented will be under NDA) during and after the event.

Yesterday we finally got the agendas for our respective areas of expertise (Security for me and ISA Server for Tom). The data on the scheduling site is considered confidential so I can't talk about it now, but I can say there are a couple of sessions that look really interesting and I'm looking forward to them.

This year I'll try to take a lot more pictures, too. I'm hoping that, unlike last year, I'll have all my big projects finished before the Summit and won't have to be rushing back to the hotel room to get work done every evening. Maybe I'll even get to have a little fun. :)

deb@shinder.net   www.debshinder.com

You know how it is with relationships. Just one betrayal can destroy trust for a long time, and make you forget all the wonderful things that went before. Well, that's what happened to me last week with Office 2007.

Despite the complaints I've voiced here and elsewhere about Outlook's seeming dementia (sometimes it remembers my settings and preferences, and sometimes it doesn't), I generally like Office 2007 a lot. I like the ribbon interface, I like the new features such as the mini toolbar that pops up right next to text you highlight, I like the new file XML file formats. I was defending Office 2007 when half the tech writers on the planet were cursing it. 

But last week it betrayed me, and it may take a while for me to trust it again. Something I really loved about Outlook 2003 was that I never, ever lost my Word data. If Outlook crashed, if the entire OS crashed, if the power went out and the computer went down completely, the next time Word opened there was my document in the recovery list. I might lose a line or two of text, but no more. Word 2007 is supposed to work the same way. But last week, it didn't.

I was working on a particularly important white paper, one I'd been sweating over, one that was coming along slowly as I ferreted out the information I needed, tested the software, and put everything together. Spoiled by Word's reliability over the last few years, I'd gotten out of the habit of manually saving as often as I should. Suddenly, out of the blue, Word closed on me. No familiar dialog box saying the program had encountered an error and needed to close, just Poof! and it was gone.

I wasn't worried. I'd open it back up and recover my doc as I always had before - at least, that's what I thought. But when I opened the program, although the recovery pane appeared on the left side of the window, the white paper I'd been working on, the only document whose recovery mattered, wasn't listed there. I opened the copy saved on my hard disk, to find that I'd last saved it about half an hour before, and the page and a half I'd typed in the interim wasn't there.

Luckily, recreating it wasn't too difficult, but it took time that I really didn't have since I was up against a steep deadline. Redoing it may have even made what I wrote better - but that's not the point. The point is that Word let me down. And now I'm wary of its ability to keep my data safe. I'm back to hitting CTRL + S every few lines. It's probably a good habit to have ... but I still feel betrayed. And even though it hasn't happened again since, I can no longer take it for granted that Word will be faithful. If it strayed once, who knows when it may do it again?

deb@shinder.net    www.debshinder.com

For the past two weeks, I've been agonizing over the decision to buy a new laptop to run Vista. I've been spoiled by all the new features in Vista and really missed them when I had to go back to XP when "on the road." And with the annual MVP Summit in Redmond coming up in a couple of weeks, I really wanted to be able to use Vista there.

Running the Vista Upgrade Advisor on my old notebook, an earlier Sony VAIO TX model, showed that the video card and sound card weren't Vista ready. Unfortunately, with portables you can't just yank out an incompatible card and put in a compatible one as you can with desktop systems. Besides, Tom's VAIO is older than mine and lacking some of its nice features, such as the SD card slot. His hard drive is smaller, too. Since he's vowed not to use Vista until at least SP1, I knew he'd be happy to take over my newer laptop in the interim.

So I started looking at the new Vista-ready subnotebooks. I have absolutely loved the Sony, especially its tiny size and light weight (2.78 lbs). The only way it could be more perfect would be if it were a Tablet - and supported Vista. So my first choice was a newer TX model that runs Aero. But there were a couple more interesting-looking options out there, too.

I was mightily attracted to the Toshiba R400. That is one good looking computer, with its piano black on ivory white color scheme. And it's a Tablet, too. It weighs about a pound more than the Sonys (3.79 lbs) but I could probably live with that. One compensating factor was the very cool "Edge Display," which uses Windows SideShow technology to display the time and email and calendar info on a small screen on the outside of the computer that you can see without opening the lid. You can see it here: http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/ebtext.to?page=r400_micro&src=MAWB&cm_mmc=toshiba_content-_-home_flash%20header-_-toshiba.com-_-rome_jan07 

Negatives? The high price, for one. At $3400, it costs over a thousand dollars more than the Sony. That's a big difference. But I was still considering biting the bullet and paying it -- until I finally tracked down some info on the battery life. More than one reviewer said they got only about 1.5 to 2 hours on a charge. Ouch. With the standard battery, my little Sony gives me 6 hours easily, over 7 with wi-fi turned off. And putting a higher capacity battery in the Toshie would make it even heavier.

I also took a close look at a couple of ultra portables, the Sony U series and the OQO 2. Here are some pictures that show just how small they really are:

OQO running Vista

 
Sony U series

Unlike some folks, I didn't really have a problem seeing the screen. But as neat as it would be to have a computer that small, I need a real keyboard, one on which I can touch type. I can type 80 to 90 wpm, and that's the way I take notes in meetings, etc. That realization made me realize something else: I wouldn't really use the tablet functionality on the Toshie that much, either. It would be useful for occasionally drawing diagrams, but I'm not going to be doing much handwriting; I can type far faster.

Everything I saw kept bringing me back to what I already had: the Sony TX. So a couple of days ago, I trekked over to the SonyStyle store at the Galleria and picked up a new one, preloaded with Vista Business edition. It's very much like my old one, except that the case is a lovely white, it has a bigger hard drive (80 GB vs. 60), more RAM (1.5 GB) and a fingerprint sensor. And of course, its video adapter runs Aero Glass. I have everything configured the way I like it now, and I think I made the right choice. I'm sure I can think of something else to buy with that $1000 I saved by choosing the Sony instead of the Toshiba.

Here are some photos of the new addition to the family:

Here are side-by-side photos of the new kid on the block and the old guy (soon to become Tom's):

The display quality is fantastic. I don't always agree with Sony about things like music DRM, but I like their products, especially those with a display. I guess that's the reason we own two widescreen Sony TVs, too (along with Sony home theater equipment).

deb@shinder.net    www.debshinder.com

I began writing this from the Dallas Convention Center, where the Microsoft Dallas launch event for Windows Vista and Office 2007 is in progress. There's a good crowd present, with a number of exhibitor booths (the HP booth seems to be the most popular, with a long line in front of it; they're giving away some popular goodies there).

The keynote included some great demos of the flashier features in Vista and Office, as well as new security technologies and a lot of good info on Office Communication Server - which made me want to go out and implement one.

Kai Axford, from the Dallas Microsoft office, gave an excellent presentation (as usual) on protecting your information with such technologies as Forefront Client Security, IRM/RMS, Group policy, and more.

For lunch, there was a choice of a sandwich boxes: Italian ham, chicken Caesar and grilled veggie; I had the veggie sandwich, which was pretty good for a boxed lunch.

There are three different session tracks for IT pros, one for management types and one for developers. Microsoft gave away free software - a copy of Office 2007 and a pre-release copy of Vista - to attendees. As an MVP volunteering my time, I had a surprisingly difficult time convincing them that I should get a goodie bag, too. But finally those handing them out found someone in charge and I got mine.

All in all, it was a fun day, and we heard lots of good stuff about Windows Mobile 6, including the fact that they'll be having a Dallas launch event for it sometime in the future. Hope to see you all there.

deb@shinder.net  www.debhinder.com

I know it's a lot less work to write about FUD than, say, to discuss features and how they actually work. But I'm getting a little tired of the sensational headlines warning computer users about all the dire consequences of installing Microsoft's new operating system.

Michael Geist, whose columns I usually enjoy, recently published a piece titled Vista's Fine Print Raises Red Flags (http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/1640/159/) that's a good example of this - though less overwrought than many.

The EULA is certainly a legit topic, and since so few software users ever actually read what they're agreeing to, discussing it in an article like this is useful. What bothers me are the implications that Vista's licensing terms are somehow much less user-friendly than those of most other software programs.  The article talks about "an unprecedented loss of consumer control over their own computers." Aside from the grammatical problem with that charge, there's an accuracy problem, too.

The author offers as evidence of this "unprecedented loss" the fact that the agreement grants Microsoft the right to regularly check the legitimacy of the software and that users have to activate Vista by associating it with a particular computer. Don't look now, but this isn't the first time those requirements have been in a licensing agreement.

The article goes on to point to Windows Defender, making it sound ominous that the built-in anti-spyware program can remove programs rated as high or severe risk by default. Well, that's sort of what anti-spyware software does. Windows Defender can, of course, be turned off or its default configuration changed but that isn't mentioned.

To further illustrate the "unprecedented loss," the article notes that "the terms and conditions leave no doubt about who is in control by providing that 'this agreement only gives you some rights to use the software. Microsoft reserves all other rights.'" That's been the nature of the beast for decades when it comes to software licenses.

The big difference is that now, software vendors (and Microsoft is by no means the only one) are not relying on users to comply with the agreements they accepted; now they're incorporating technological means of enforcing those agreements. If that technology doesn't work properly and keeps legal users from using the software, that's another issue. But there's nothing very unprecedented about the terms of the agreement itself.

deb@shinder.net    www.debshinder.com

USB flash memory drives and other removable disks can be a great convenience – but they can also pose a security threat. It’s awfully easy for someone to download data to one and make off with it. And if there’s a CD or DVD burner installed, that’s another way someone can take away data. Yet another option is to download data to an MP3 player or cell phone. Vista gives you a way to block the use of these devices through Group Policy. You can allow people to read data on their devices but not write to them, or you can block the use of the devices altogether.

Here's how to prevent writing to removable disks but still allow users to read from them:

1. Log on as an administrator.
2. Click Start and in the Start Search box, type gpedit.msc to open the Group Policy Object Editor. You'll be prompted to continue.
3. In the left pane of the GPO editor, expand Computer Configuration and then Administrative Templates.
4. Under System, click Removable Storage Access.
5. In the right pane, double click Removable Disks: Deny write access.
6. Click Enabled.
7. Click OK.

Note that WPD devices refers to cell phones, media players, auxiliary displays, CE devices and the like.

I blogged recently about trying out Vista's speech recognition feature. Although it works fairly well, I noted that I probably won't use it.

If you do intend to use it, here's some security advice: turn it off when you aren't actively using it. Here's why: sound files that automatically play from web sites could actually issue commands to your computer and delete files or run some programs. How scary is that?

George Ou goes into detail about this in his blog at
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Ou/?p=416.

By default, once you enable speech recognition it starts up when you boot the OS. I took it out of the Startup programs, and when I do use it, as soon as I'm done dictating, I close it. Yes, you can put it to sleep by telling it to "stop listening," but if a sound file that says "Start listening" should play, guess what? Best to turn it to "Off" isntead of "Sleep," even though it'll be a little more trouble to turn it back on again. Its icon will still appear in the system tray (er, notification area) and you can right click to turn it back on. If you aren't going to use it, turn it off completely (then the tray icon and Speech Recognition control panel will disappear).

I agree with George that at the very least, turning on Speech Rec should require a passphrase. Let's hope the folks at MSFT are at work on an update that addresses this problem.

deb@shinder.net     www.debshinder.com

Spent the morning trying to get the Mobile Device Center in Vista to work, and finally succeeded. This is the built in application that's supposed to replace ActiveSync for synchronizing Windows Mobile devices such as my Samsung i730 Pocket PC phone.

Even though I've been using Vista as my primary OS for more than six months, I was still syncing the PPC phone with an XP machine. Now that I've replaced that computer with my new Vista machine, I figured it was time to figure out the synchronization thing.

In Control Panel, there was an applet called Mobile Device Center but clicking it only opened a little Connection Settings dialog box that was very sparse, as shown below:

That was it. I knew that wasn't right - articles on the web told me that the Device center was supposed to look like this:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/_assets/images/WMDC/WMDC.jpg 

A little research turned up a download from the Microsoft site, here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=83D513EA-9DF9-4920-AF33-3A0E2E4E7BEB&displaylang=en

So I downloaded and installed it. Now I had this:

Well, we're getting closer - but still no cigar. Clicking the options just brought up the same "waiting for device to connect" dialog box. Trouble is, the device was connected. I checked the USB cables several times, and when I placed the PPC in the cradle, it makes that familiar sound that used to mean ActiveSync was starting up. But nothing happens.

I also didn't have all the icons in my Mobile Device Center menu that were shown on all the Web sites. So I started hunting down troubleshooting articles. I found them full of such obvious advice as:

I declined licensing agreement (EULA) and now I cant launch the app – You will need to accept the EULA for Windows Mobile Device Center to run. To proceed, simply disconnect and reconnect your device to accept the EULA. The EULA can be read at any time through the Windows Mobile Center’s Help Menu.

Nothing seemed to address my problem. Oh well. First rule of network troubleshooting: start at the physical level. Okay, the cables were plugged in - so I tried unplugging them and reconnecting. And eureka! That was the answer. Now I have a nice little "Connected" message and my Device Center looks like everyone else's:

I can browse the contents of my PPC, add pictures and video, install programs, etc. Here's a neat feature: there's an option to add media to your device from Windows Media Player.

Okay, I'm happy now. It wasn't a complete no-brainer, but getting connected with the Mobile Device Center proved easier than the first time I set up ActiveSync. And it certainly looks a lot prettier.

deb@shinder.net   www.debshinder.com

I first tried Vista's speech recognition a week or so ago and was terribly disappointed in it. Results were hilarious; it misunderstood what I was saying even more thoroughly than my liberal friends do. :)

Since I was using a cheapie little desktop microphone, I decided to give it the benefit of the doubt and went out last night and bought a nice USB headset.  Well, it made all the difference in the world (and to be fair, Microsoft tells you in the Speech Rec setup process that a headset is preferred).

I also went through all the training sessions this time, and after completing them, I was able to use the voice commands almost flawlessly. Pretty cool to say "Click Start" and see the Start menu open as if by magic. I can navigate through the file system pretty well this way.

Dictation, on the other hand, is still not something I'd want to have to do on a regular basis. In Word, most of my dictation was recognized - but every couple of sentences, it would get a word wrong. If I make a mistake while typing, backspacing and correcting it is a quick fix. With speech, it takes forever to select the wrong word, pick the right one and get it replaced. Oh, it works -- but in the time I could dictate five sentences, I could have typed at least half a page.

Of course, I type around 80-90 wpm. For someone who hunts and pecks, this might actually be a viable alternative. And I can say now that, if my hands were suddenly unusable, I would still be able to get work done, albeit at an excruciating pace.

The headset that ended up working so well is a Cyber Acoustics model AC-850 that I picked up at Circuit City. It was the least expensive USB headset they had (those don't come cheap, though; it was forty bucks and the others I saw were sixty or more).

I'm not going to be throwing away my keyboard anytime soon, but Microsoft is going in the right direction. Vista's speech rec is much better than the version that was built into Office 2003 and even though it might not be for me, I suspect some folks are going to really embrace it.

deb@shinder.net   www.debshinder.com

Anyone who's known me for long knows that I am a multi-monitor evangelist. I go around extolling the virtues of increasing your screen real estate and I've made quite a few converts. As almost all of them say, once you've used multiple monitors, you never want to go back.

UltraMon is a handy little tool that I discovered years ago, which extends the functionality of multiple monitors even more. My favorite feature is the "smart toolbar" - it lets you put a taskbar on every screen and you can set it up so that the programs open on each screen appear on its taskbar, or so that all programs appear on all taskbars.

Well, it turns out the latest version, UltraMon 2.7.1, works just great on Vista. You can download a free trial at http://www.realtimesoft.com/ultramon/.  It costs forty bucks to buy, but it's well worth it if you use multiple monitors.

Another nice feature is the ability to use different wallpapers and screen savers on each monitor. Here's a photo of my tri-monitor Vista desktops with different wallpapers:

With UltraMon you can use a different wallpaper on each monitor

Other features include shortcuts to open programs on a specific monitor and in a specific position, buttons for one-click moving of a window to a different monitor, and more. One that I especially like is the ability to save your icon position and restore it with a few clicks.

If you want to get more out of your multiple monitor setup, check it out.

After setting up the new office space downstairs, I started looking around for an inexpensive and compact printer/copier so I wouldn't have to trek up the stairs whenever I want to make a hard copy of something. This became even more of an issue after I hurt my back, and going up and down the stairs became a painful maneuver.

Went down to Fry's to see what they had in stock. This wasn't to be a replacement for the big OfficeJet upstairs, just a supplement. I really wanted something small that would still get the job done. I was amazed at the sizes of the new low-end HP OfficeJets. They're about the size of two toasters sitting side by side and take up very little room on a desktop.

I ended up buying the model 6310. It wasn't actually my first choice; I tried to get the 6180 first. At $299, it had a small screen for previewing photos. However, they were all out of that model so I settled for the 6310, which cost $50 less and didn't have the preview screen. It did, however, have just about everything else, including a built in 6 in 1 flash card reader for printing photos without going through the computer. Here you can see the small footprint of the printer on my desk:

Big value/features in a tiny footprint

Getting it working was fairly simple, although we had some problems at first due to not removing all the inside packing material - but that was our fault. It's a network printer and we attached it to the Ethernet switch on my desk so it's accessible to the other computers on the network.

It's pretty fast: 30 ppm for black and 24 ppm for color. It has a sheet feeder and will enlarge/reduce copies. That's pretty much all I needed - but I got a lot more. The photo printing feature turned out to be very cool. Insert a flash card and you can print one, some or all of the photos on the card instantly. You can also print a proof sheet, and then select the size/format for printing the final photos. Or you can connect a digital camera to the front USB port and print photos from it. Quality of photos printed on photo paper was very nice.

The scanner works great with good quality scans. I haven't installed PaperPort yet as I need to get the newest version that works with Vista, but I'll be installing that and will report back on how it works with the 6310.

I send faxes only occasionally, but the sophisticated fax features on this machine inspired me to hook it up. It has a 100 page memory and 100 number speed dialing. The scanner worked great with Vista's Windows Fax and Scan applet, without my having to install the HP software.

My only real complaint is that it's far from silent when it's printing. But I can put up with the noise to get this many features at this price. The cartridges also seem small compared to those for some other machines. I'll have to see how fast it goes through them. It would also be nice if it held more paper, but hey, then it probably wouldn't be this small.

I paid $249 at Fry's; you can find it for even less on the Web if you don't mind the wait:

http://www.amazon.com/Officejet-Printer-Scanner-Q8061A-ABA/dp/B000F2KRGK/sr=1-1/qid=1170696462/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-3863876-1399040?ie=UTF8&s=electronics 

Here's an up-close look at it. The control panel is very intuitive and easy to use:

 
Easy to use control panel.