- 01.10.2002 -
Here is a letter I recently received that may help those of you that emailed me about your similar web dialler problems. Since then I've managed to prevent the web dialler installing itself again by disallowing ActiveX downloads in my browser options window. This does produce those annoying windows asking if I'll allow this or that to download from this web site but at least I have control now.
First off, the majority of people who emailed me have had trouble with a dialler called instantpleasure if I recall correctly. This is different from WebDialler but effectively they do similar things, namely to call an expensive phone number after taking over control of your modem. Only cable modem and always-on users are pretty safe from these trojan diallers.
Some of you have asked what sites should I avoid getting a virus? That's not really an easy question to answer. Pr0n sites obviously have the highest number of web dialler instances reported. Saying that however, after installing McAfee's VirusScan software it reported that PVP, a favourite site of mine that I visit daily, had a virus. It was called 'Jclose' and as far as I can tell it had some code in the web page, which allowed the browser window to not be closed down by any conventional means. That was a one off and my virus killer no longer detects it so I'm guessing Scott Kurtz or his web host solved the problem.
Anyway, my main point is you can never be too careful when it comes to surfing on the internet. All I can recommend is a decent firewall (I use ZoneAlarm), a decent virus killer (McAfee) and a spyware killer (Ad-aware). A popup killer wouldn't hurt either. Check out download.com for what's hot in the world of free software.
Allan Weyman writes..
David
I read your article on illicite webdialers when I searched the net looking for info on how to rid the machine of the pest.With some of your suggestions and some one elses and some of my own I finally after many hours eradicated it. Of all the programs I downloaded Swat it trogan hunter was the most effective but it was combination of suggestions and many hours before I had a result.
Anyhow the purpose of my email as you seem the sort of person who will put this info around and this is the only way we will erradicate this sort of thing. After wasting many hours on this and with the prospect of reformatting the hardrive I got mad and tracked down the company responsible for marketing the code, Ecommerce. I actually threatened to take legal action if I had to reformat the drive and I may well have done, anyhow this has bought this official response from them (I must admit I was suprised they replied). I add as I have now purged my computer I have not tried this and it is done at users risk but it seemed pretty kosher, here is their reply.
Dear Mr. Weyman,
here you'll find the latest update of the uninstall-tool:
http://econnect.libereco.net/uninstall/uninstall.exe
- run the uninstall.exe
- then delete the destop icon and the Icon in the system tray in the lower right hand corner manually.
- reboot your computer
To delete the dialer manually:
- Run regedit.exe
- Find HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Mircosoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
- On the right hand side, are all the programs that starts automatically.
(You will see the path for the program as well, delete the entry out of the regestry and please make sure to delete it also from your harddrive)
- Delete links out of the start menu and from the desktop.
Please check here HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run, too if the dialer still stays on.
If this still doesn't work, please check if there is a rdve.exe on your computer.
If there is, please go ahead like this:
After using the uninstall program, re-start windows in MS-DOS mode.
Then go to the directory which had that program (rdve.exe) and delete it.
Now please turn back to the Windows Mode it should be gone then.
Kind Regards,
Your liberECO Support Team
Hope this is of some use to you or any of your readers.
Regards,
Allan Weyman
- 16.10.2002 -
Ok I'm playing catch-up here.
I went to Ipswich for several reasons. The main one I'll have to admit was a break from job hunting (ha ha) and to see the guys again. I took my PC with me as a LAN game was suggested for Sunday. I'd had a few teething problems with it hence the lack of a comic that Thursday. It seems that Win98SE is not entirely compatible with my BIOS and crashed a lot. Luckily by renaming the BIOS.VXD file in your C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\ directory to BIOS.OLD you can boot your Windows OS without it accessing the BIOS, which is useful if you want to rollback your current OS and you need your machine to soft reboot.
Anyway, that done I loaded up and drove the 260 miles south. God I hate that trip. Between Leeds and Stamford I can only get one FM radio channel on my car radio and that usually sucks.
As it turned out Speedway was not on that Thursday so I caught up with Hing and Mark over a KFC and a few games of pool. Over the next few days we watched the Banger racing, ate out, went shopping, played on the PS2 and generally caught up on what we'd all been getting up to since I was last here. Sunday came and I got my arse handed to me on a plate by JP in UT. I was rusty and a tad merde and took to camping at one point. There's something about headshots in UT that reminds me of a little Amiga game called Geeks.
I got a call from my agent, as I was about to leave saying I had a job interview in Ipswich at 2pm. It was 10:30am. Could I make it? Er.. yeah.
Picture this. I drive into town, park up then go to the shops to buy a shirt and trousers (thanks Hing for the loan of a tie). I then return to my car and when no one is looking I do a Mr.Bean and quick change in my car. A woman looks at me strangely as I step out and adjust my tie in the wing mirror and tuck myself in. All set.
The interview went well but due to problems with their technical guys availability I was told to go home and they'd call me back in a few days. I drove home but they asked me to return the next day. I came back on the train. To cut a long story short, they decided they needed a developer in the end so I felt my time had been wasted however I did enjoy my time in Ipswich and it was good to see all the guys again. I'm back now after an eventful train ride home involving the police and some drunken Scots. (Hi to John!)
Now that I'm back I've been working on the new Detox web site. Well I say new, I'm actually converted this one so it will work on the new host, which utilises embedded tags and a strict directory structure. I'm also experiencing DNS problems with the URL. One minute I can see it, the next I can't. Once I am happy with it though I'll point this URL to the new one.
- 17.10.2002 -
It's been an interesting twenty minutes so far
I got out of bed this drizzly morning and discovered two pieces of post awaiting me. The first was a court summons. What? Some solicitors had finally tracked me down for non-payment of a final electricity bill. This can't be right, as I am meticulous when it comes to paying bills. I call up the electricity company in question and get to the bottom of it. Apparently when I changed suppliers they forgot to tell the other supplier. How does that work then? They both produced final bills and I paid off the new company. The old company's bill arrives at my old flat when I'm somewhere in Europe.
This is one of them signs that tell you to KEEP ALL YOUR BLOODY PAPERWORK YOU MORON. Buggrit as foul ol' Ron would say. Anyway, I paid them off and fixed a cuppa. Sigh.
Then I remembered the second letter. This was a cheque from the DHSS. Huh? I applied for NI contributions only. I call em up. Apparently when I worked I paid a lot of NI (funny that as us contractors try not to) so I am eligible for the dole. Cool. The day just got better. Pappa needs some new Levi's.
How's your day so far?
- 22.10.2002 -
Argh emergency! One of my most important electrical devices failed today! Oh god No. Out with the screwdriver to check the fuse. Nope, that's fine. Hmm.. these contacts look dirty, a little bit of TLC and some wet and dry paper and they were as good as new. Phew, emergency averted. The kettle works once again and the caffeine crisis is over.
:o)
I've been receiving this weekly IT periodical, Computer Weekly. Over the last few issues they have been exploring the world of online job advertisements for the IT industry and basically came to the same conclusions that I did. Namely that it's an employers market at the moment and the employers are taking the piss. Well 80% of them are anyway.
Take a look through the job sites such as Jobserve and CWJobs and read a few of today's job adverts. Hmm. What appears to be happening at a guess is a company has a job vacancy, their human resources guy goes to the technical guy and says, what skills would you need to do this job? Then he asks for additional skills that he'd like a candidate to have followed by any thing else they can think of. The human resources guy then goes away and writes the job spec including every skill prefixed by the words 'expert in' and 'over 3 years experience'.
Now computer weekly interviewed a selection of employers who agreed it was an ideal market for them as they can be more choosey. However they said they had researched their requirements 'efficiently'.
Now us IT guys are not exactly stupid so after this reply from the employers the letters started pouring in and they were funny to read. I found them amusing anyway. I re-read the job adverts and understood what they were talking about. For instance, some companies were asking for "over 2 years experience in X" where X was something that had only been out 6 months. How the hell do you get over 2 years experience in something that has only been available for 6 months? Then there's "18K a year role will suit university graduate with experience of.." followed by a list of skills not on any university syllabus and only obtainable from direct work experience. Hmm, researched my ass.
Through job hunting I've noticed lots of tricks and scams by agencies that have started to get on my tits. I can avoid them but its time consuming. I have to remember job adverts so if I see them the next day and the next with 'new job' stamped all over them I know not to reply to them because they are some agencies way of capturing as many CVs as possible to fill up their database. Why? Well possibly so they can mass email (spam) you later with trick emails to try and get you to tell them where you have recently had interviews so they can increase their knowledge of recruiting companies. Yep, too many cooks trying to justify their existence in a continuously shrinking kitchen.
I had a call the other week from a woman at an agency whose name I cant recall. It was so obvious that she was not calling to help me look for work but to find out about my recent interviews that I just dodged her questions until she became angry. I'm too polite and could not bring myself to hang up on her but all she wanted was something from me without offering any help. You can say 'I've had no interviews recently' if you want and some may accept that but others will call you a liar. Its sad and it makes logging on to start your daily job hunt painful. So I keep a list of these time wasters and try to avoid wasting my time on them.
As for CVs..
Don't get me started on the subject of CVs. Everyone and their pet budgie named Harry has an opinion on how your CV should read. Profile followed by bullet points or big profile followed by technical skills. I've re-written it so many times I've lost count. The current version is P so what's that version 16? Just go with what you are happy with and tweak it with feedback from employers and interviews is all I can recommend.
Phew! I'm glad I got that out of my system.
Detox comic
Then it hits you, right out of the blue. You are sitting there and the idea slowly forms in your twisted brain. You know how to end the current plot. You know who the killer is and no one else will guess it. Its a great twist so you sit down and churn out a weeks worth of strips. That should do it. You smile and sit back content.
- 24.10.2002 -
Sometimes working with computers is like pulling teeth. Take today for instance. All I wanted to do was print some data from the internet but no, my printer kept hanging. So I had to cut and paste the data into Word and print it off when my computer was NOT connected to the internet as it's so temperamental. I mean, it hates the fact that Paint Shop Pro 5 is installed. Mind you the feeling is mutual as creating comics is becoming tedious as you never know if PSP will crash when I try to create the next speech bubble because it doesn't like the way I do my ellipses. I have to CTRL+S before every speech bubble! Argh.
So I've decided that it's about time I upgraded my OS. I'm going to install Win2000 on my test box and run it for a week. If its fine then I'm going to back up my main system and upgrade it. I'll create a whole bunch of comics before I do this and upload them to the new automated site so you won't miss your daily dose of Detox. You never know, something may go wrong.
I spent 2 hours yesterday updating software just so I could watch some SVCDs that a friend had sent me (thanks dude for your help and patience). My old VCD player did not understand SVCD so I upgraded my player and all was well. Well until I discovered that nothing on my machine can understand a particular film. Browsing the directory structure on the CD it appears to be SVCD utilising MPEG2 but nothing on my machine recognises the format and my new all singing and dancing multi-format player says 'unsupported format on CD in drive'. Man, I hate it when software does that. Even when you allow it to connect to the net (such as Windows Media Player) in order to download every codec under the sun.
While I'm ranting, and I know I am. What's with web sites that say you must download X, Y, Z etc before they show you anything? An example is the TV company FOX. You access the main URL and have to download one plug-in after another. All these bells and whistles are driving me mad. Ok, maybe it is because I'm still accessing the net via 56k but is it needed? Can't we still have a low band option?
Anyway I haven't surfed for the sake of surfing in ages so that's what I set out to do last night. You know, where you surf, click, surf, click and follow links until you end up at some weird-ass web site that under normal circumstances you would of never found but you find strangely intriguing anyway and before you know it it's the early hours of tomorrow.
That was my intention anyway. What happened was I ended up reading about the latest TV series around the world for about 4 hours. Yep, all those new Sci-Fi and cop shows. Plus I read the episode guides for good measure. Hey, I was bored. Want to know what's going to happen next in Buffy? How about Angel, Andromeda or Odyssey 5? Want to know about the shows that have been cancelled? Upcoming plot-twists in Enterprise or new series like Birds of Prey? Well I'm your man.
Other tit bits of info I picked up that might interest the junk TV buffs like me out there:
- Dinotopia is now a TV series being filmed in Hungary after the success of the 3-part mini-series.
- There's a surveillance cop series like The Shield stateside called The Wire that looks interesting.
- CBS TV is trying to compete with C.S.I (which has a spin-off called C.S.I Miami starring a couple of actors from NYPD Blue) with a show called Without a Trace about a team that have to recreate the life of missing persons that just disappear in extreme detail in order to locate them. Hey if the formula works, copy it.
- John Hannah (our own Rebus) is playing a Doc in MDs stateside and Mark Addy is a father in a sitcom. In fact I read plots for series that employ lots of us Brits in the States.
- John Doe - Hmm.. not content with Lazarus Man or The Bourne Identity storylines, we have John Doe, a guy that has no memory of who he is but the Encyclopaedia Britannia in his head. He knows everything and I mean everything! So of course he solves crimes and acts all mysterious. It does read well however so I wouldn't mind taking a gander at some episodes.
- The guy from Renegade becomes Immortal and starts to hunt demons in a modern day plot aptly named The Immortal.
- Firefly - the transport ship Serenity with its outlaw crew are flying around space 500 years from now trying to keep under the radar of the law. Looks and feels very Sam Raimi or maybe that's because all the cast have probably worked alongside Bruce Campbell in one Raimi/Tappart series or another. It's actually produced by Buffy's creator Joss Whedon so I wouldn't mind seeing if it fares better than Andromeda did over here.
- Fast lane - Think Fast and the Furious mixed with Miami vice. Two guys, one an experienced undercover cop and one an ex LA gang banger with a gorgeous baywatch-esque boss in a power-suit. Cue bad guys in gangs our heroes have to infiltrate with confiscated suped up Jap import cars; designer suits and Rolexes no doubt confiscated from drug dealers and you have fast lane. A guys Friday night in with some popcorn and a bad case of testosterone rage. Bring it on.
- Birds of Prey - I mentioned this above and you all probably know more about this than me already. Basic plot is Batman does a disappearing act and Batgirl, now injured is left to clean up the mess so she recruits two babes to help her fight crime. As long as they look good and wear tight outfits I don't mind. Heck, I only watch Witchblade these days to check out glimpses of Yancy Butler's mid-riff.
- Adventure Inc - Michael Biehn (Come with me if you want to live) and co go on adventures around the world in a custom boat. Not sure about this one.
There were lots more besides but these were the few that stick out in my mind as maybe worth a looksy. Other shows seemed to follow similar threads or well known and well travelled plot paths. Or maybe I just watch to much goddamn television? For instance there is a series called I believe, She Spies about 3 criminal babes caught by the FBI and have to work off their sentence (sounds like 'Players' and 'Cyber City' right?) but looks very much 'VIP' so maybe worth missing. Then there's loads of generic cop shows that feel like 'NYPD Blue' or 'Law and Order' and law shows like 'Judging Amy' and 'Crossing Jordan' the latter's brief reading like an episode of 'One Waikiki West'. In fact if you read the cast lists you'll see that everyone is just moving around these shows. Jill Hennessy in Crossing Jordan was previously in Law and Order and I've already mentioned that Delaney and Co have moved from NYPD Blue to CSI Miami.
Have you spotted any shows on the horizon worth a look?
I'm also looking for someone to write a column for Detox. If you are interested. Drop me an email, including your first rant if you can.
- 27.10.2002 -
Error 502 DNS error
Well I was hoping to have a link here today to the new host but Keenspace are experiencing DNS problems and they have no idea when it will be resolved so I'll keep on updating this site with new comics.
If however you want to jump the gun and you want to see if you can see the new site then the URL is detox.keenspace.com Only the comics are there at the moment.
Driving me insane
I like to think I'm on the ball now when it comes to computer viruses. The amount of time I spent trying to remove the last one and the subsequent installation of a decent killer with regular updates being the prime reasons.
However over the last week my virus killer has been finding viruses left right and center and removing them. This has been an annoyance because at first this virus appeared to be infecting all the EXE files associated with desktop icons. But now it appears to be random. When not ten minutes after performing a system scan, my virus killer found another virus and I am not even connected to the internet, I suspect something is up. So I make a note of the virus name 'Insane.dam' and go to McAfee's web site to learn about it. This is what I find:
"The W32/Insane.dam detection was added to detect corrupt W32/Insane infected files. Any W32/Insane.dam detections in the field are likely to be false detections with unsupported scan engines."
Hmm false detections. In other words no virus. This rings true as when the last virus found window appeared I selected STOP rather than CLEAN/DELETE and then told it to scan that file again at which point it found no virus. So I read further and discovered that my engine version is new and not the version equated with these false detections. So there is no cure yet for this bug other than recognising that these detections are false and not selecting to remove the infected files. Meanwhile I have to reinstall a lot of software that had its main EXE file deleted.
Sometimes virus killers can be as annoying as the viruses themselves.
- 30.10.2002 -
The local
I was in the pub last night (hence late update of the comic today) when I ran into an old mate from University. Last I heard he'd gone down south to work for a computer games company. Now with 2 years under his belt he's back up this way working for 'Reflections' on Driver 3. We had an interesting chat on the state of the games industry, how much coders actually get these days (I was curious) and what it takes to get into the industry. He also told me how they develop the games utilising 'special' console boxes. For instance they use a special PS2 that is ten times the size of a normal PS2 and has 'TOOL' embossed on the side of it.
The Idea
After the current storyline has completed and the intermission strips are completed I have been thinking about concentrating more on the graphics in my strips. I don't really do backgrounds at present because I use a smaller window pane than other strips and so there is limited space already for speech bubbles. However, if I increase the panes I can fit more in. Either that or try something different for a while. I mean, I've been toying with the idea of doing a Gunbuster type strip. If you've seen the anime series you'll know that their intermissions feature characters a third their normal size. This would take up less space, be easier to draw and I can have full-length shots. It's an idea anyway.
- Halloween -
I joined a gym today. It's a local gym just 5 minutes around the corner from me. It's their ten-year anniversary so they've halved membership costs. They offered me a free demo so I took a look at the place. It's mainly geared towards fitness rather than weight training but it's only a few quid a week for unlimited access for everything. The warm-up area has running machines, cycles and rowers with TV playing music channels. Not bad. Then there's a weight room, which has loads of the pin and pulley variety of equipment and no free weights. This is a minor disappointment as it's an ideal environment for me to get fit in. I have free weights at home just no benches or anything so this will make up for it.
They also have a sauna, tanning salon and health care room. I'm going for my induction tomorrow and to meet the personal trainer to get my stats taken so my progress can be monitored and I can be advised on fitness programs and nutritional info. I'm kinda looking forward to it.
David Kei
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