Posts by kc0arf

Hello,

Are you sure that you want to make a DLL, as in the traditional Windoze DLL (Dynamic Linked Library?) I do not believe Mac Excel will support that... then again they may have added new features to Office 2004 that will do that sort of thing.

Are you sure you aren't thinking of Macros? Windoze-developed Macros should work just fine in the equivelant Office program... because they are within the Office program, and can work.

A DLL, to my understanding, is an OS thing, and yes, the Mac uses linked libraries, but I am certain they are structurally different than the Windoze codebase.

Christian

Hi,

You may also want to see if those screens will be supported by your Packard Bell computer. If it is an older one, your video card might not have the horsepower to drive the screens.

Christian

Hello,

You may wish to check out the techniques found at:

http://www.securemac.com/openfirmwarepasswordprotection.php

OpenFirmware is similar to BIOS that you find on intel hardware. It is a bootup password that will prevent all I/O activities until the password challenge is satisfied. The webpage describes some adanced work, so if you are not comfortable doing this on your own, you best take it to an Apple Dealer and have them do it.

Christian

Hello,

Are you referring to Freehand, as in Aldus Freehand, the vector graphics program similar to Illustrator? I am wondering if Freehand had the type control characteristics that Quark, InDesign, RagTime offer.

Thanks,

Christian

Hello,

Your version of Sendmail is rather old -- I am running 8.12.8-9.90 on my machine. Granted, sendmail is not something to just run out and patch, but you should consider it, as I think they found big security problems in 8.11

I would start there.

Christian

Hello,

What is your network topology, meaning, what does your network look like? Would it be possible for you to draw it out. Something like this:

CABLE MODEM ==> HUB |------> CPU 1
| -----> CPU 2
| ------> CPU 3

Would like to see a diagram before we start talking.

Christian

Hello,

I think I will write a tutorial on firewalls too. May need a couple days to get it out though.

Christian

Hello,

It sounds like a good deal. Do not wish to steal your thunder, but if people are more comfortable donating "locally", the USMC (United States Marine Corps) has an annual "Toys for Tots", and offer in many major cities, the ability to drive up and place a Toy in the box.

Thanks for the note,

Christian

Hello Jason,

OS X 10.1 was better than 10.0, but in many ways not ready for primetime. Certain video drivers were not ready for older machines, printing times were horiffic, and it was just not ready for the big day.

I would encourage you to backup any data you may have on that system, and then upgrade to 10.2 Let us know how much RAM you have and your hard disk size... you might need to increase RAM.

Not sure why your downloads are not working properly. Perhaps it is in your browser... 10.1 came with IE, and that could be corrupting your downloads.

In my opinion, when you receive a new computer, either right out of the box, or purchased / given second hand, it should be automatic to reformat the computer and install the OS yourself. There may be other problems with the prior installation, or perhaps private files from the previous owner that you should destroy (hey -- if these were cars, and the previous guy left his shoes in the trunk, you wouldn't drive around for weeks with his stuff, would you?)

Let us know.

Christian

Hello,

Which email client did you switch to? I am running Eudora here, and really enjoy it. I ask because the next question would be how did you migrate your addressbook settings and the like.

Thanks,

Christian

HI,

I have returned to wu-ftpd as it appears most flexible to me. BUt I also firewall it off to the internet, so that no incoming internet connections can use FTP to reach me. For internet connections, I have SCP available.

Christian

Hello,

I like LILO or GRUB. Am using GRUB more these days.

Christian

Hi,

Am I reading correctly that you have the source RPM's on your RedHat9 server, and are trying to use a client to connect and install from the RedHat 9 server?

I have had to replace vsftpd with wuftpd inorder to install from my RH9 box to a new RH9 box. I did a packet sniff, and the protocol stuff is all there and accurate. Dunno why I had to switch, but I had to.

You may want to expand more on what you are trying to do.

Christian

Hello,

My first computer was an Apple IIe back in the day.

First Macintosh was a Mac LC in 1991.

Then the PowerMac 7100 in 1993.

Then the Powerbook 520 in 1995.

Then the Powerboog G3 in 2000.

The 7100 is in use with an accelerator card by my cousin in college, along with the Personal Laserwriter LS that I got with it. The Powerbook 520 is geared for emergency use with ham radio equipment and terminal programs. The G3 is my current machine. The LC was given up for charity. The IIe is in a box for historical meaning for me.

Christian

Hello,

AVOID QUARK LIKE THE PLAGUE!!! If you have any doubts, go to www.quark.com and into the support forums, found off the Support menu. You will see the wrath of people getting PAID to use the Quark program, and they are about to cause a revolution in the DTP industry. While it may be true that Quark is #1 in the industry, Adobe is giving them a serious run for the money, and a conversion may happen. Quark remains hostile to the user community. Stay away from it!

I have migrated my Quark materials to Ragtime. The Ragtime interface is a different pariidgm, but it is cross platform, and the software works, and works WELL. For the home user who doesn't want to shell out $$ for the program, Ragtime is awesome. Many a club newsletter have been made with it.

Christian

Hello,

I am curious why you were in single user mode to try and update the system. Single User mode is a really pared down system, and a lot of the libraries are unloaded. Perhaps the file you are referring to is populated dynamically when the system is loaded. Thus, without the underlying library loading, the file would remain empty. Just a thought.

Christian

Hello,

OS X comes with a control panel called Software Update that may be run (manually or automatically) to update the computers. If you would like to track things down manually outside of SU, you can go to the website http://www.apple.com/support/ and grab them yourself.

Not quite certain what 1.1.2 is.... usually the OS X updates have begun with the number 10, such as 10.3.6 which is the latest panther update.

Christian

Hello,

I am currently evaluating Sophos on my Windoze box, my Linux boxen, and my Macintosh. So far, so good.

I also believe in ditching IE. Go for Mozilla Firefox, or consider Opera or Casino. Safari works nice too. IE has a certain set of standards defined that are not platform independant. I would like sites that examine their logs to know that there are other browsers out there than the Redmond Explorer.

Christian

Hello,

Just to comment a few things:

1) Explorer on the Mac has reached end-of-life status. It is older, and no longer maintainted. Not surprised that you are seeing problems there.

2) Do you have cookies enabled / disabled? They might be the cause of your other browsers forgetting who you are.

3) Mozilla is pushing their Firefox / Firebird web browser. Might want to look at that one. They just upgraded it.

4) Safari was just upgraded with 10.3.6

5) I am curious how Linux browsers would display your website.

Christian

Hello,

The delay is going to depend on a few things, such as the speed of your network, and the protocols associated with it. For example, I think Appletalk packets time out after 30 - 45 seconds. I remember the days of OS 9 looking and waiting for a server before the connection timed out. Just had to sit there and wait. Appletalk was designed in the day that networks were *not* reliable, such as dialups and phonenet, where delays and confusion were part of the expected interference.

I am noticing OS X taking time resolving DNS names. Seems that the timeout is too short or something. Not good.

Have a good one,

Christian

Hello,

Is it a physical mark on the surface of the disk (like a scratch), or is the mark a discoloration of the media? When disks are made "burned", they do change the color of the media, and I want to make sure that the mark you are refering to is abnormal.

If it is a scratched in mark, similar to an old vynil record, then you have a definate hardware issue.

Software problem? Sure. Check to see if it shows up in the System Profiler. It should be listed in there. You should also be allowed to setup the disk for burning, and then have it fail with the attempt.

As for the pen drive, I do not have one to relate to. Sorry there.

Christian

Hello,

What may be amazing is that Dani just celebrated her 22nd Birthday, placing her birthday at Nov 11, 82.

The last person to walk on the moon did so in 1973. Who would think that walking on the moon and exploring another world in the flesh would be a retro thing. So much for hyped technology... here we are with all this tech, and yet have not colonized the moon.

Christian

Hello,

It sounds like a mechanical problem to me. If you heard some bad sounds, it takes a mechanical move to hear them. Do you see any wear marks / patterns on the CD you were cooking?

With it being an eMac, it is not going to be an easy thing to get the superdrive out of there to service on it. If you have warrenty coverage, take the computer in and have it looked at (back it up first!). If you don't, and are in a real pinch, go and get a USB or Firewire external unit. I have a Sony one that was written "windows only" all over it, and she works just fine on my Powerbook.

Christian

Hello,

A modem is a dumb serial device, and there shouldn't be anything in there that identifies you as who you are, in contrast to a ethernet card that does have a MAC address on it.

My guess is that something in your game, perhaps the serial number of the game, is being referenced.

This is also a nice example of why auto-passwords are a bad idea. While tempting, don't use them! That means AOL AIM, YAHOO, MSN... your bank accounts!

Christian

Hello,

I like the cross-platform of MySQL too! While Access might be easier to initially program, I like the ability to use MySQL with Linux and Macintosh too.

Christian

Hello,

Just a friendly reminder to please avoid HiJacking someone's conversation to ask your own question and change the topic. :)

Good luck on your conversion.

Christian

Hello,

My guess is that your XP Home machine does not have you authenticated properly... in other words, doesn't know who you are. You might (change that to BETTER) have firewall software running at home, and it may be blocking your commands.

I am also very curious on why you would want to do this sort of thing, and what security-conscious network administrator would allow such a thing. You may have a special relationship with your employer to allow such a setup, but coming from a security minded administrator (me), I would not allow these commands to be effective.

If I had to implement such a thing, I would install PC Anywhere, or get encrypted VNC working, and shut the computer down via the Start Menu.

Christian

Happy Birthday, Dani.

*goes out to shed to find the birthday paddle*

:)

Christian

Hello,

Check to see if it is a DNS problem.

Open a command window, and type in "ping x" where x is the name of the website. Then, take the raw numbers it gives you (reply from w.x.y.z) and put that in the web browser. If that works, then the problem is DNS related.

For example:

Open the Command Window.
type in "ping www.daniweb.com"
--> the machine should reply with: Reply from 67.18.73.107
Open a new web browser. In the address box, type in "http://67.18.73.107"
--> the machine should find DaniWeb and show you the homepage.

Of course, leave out the quotes in this example.

If the website draws up just fine, you have a DNS problem. If it does not, you have a routing problem.

Christian

Hello,

People are telling me that Safari is running faster. As I am an avid Firefox fan (and that just got upgraded) I have not had a chance to notice.

Quicktime also had an update and another security one too.

Christian

Hello Dani,

I am behind a firewall, and have managed to avoid internet spam. Thus, I do not see much stuff fly by me. But then again, I am not running MS Office and having files with macros sent to me either.

That said, I think that any responsible computer owner should have antivirus at the ready. I am liking McAfee, but am evaluating Sophos as we speak on both my 2000 server, linux server, and Macintosh OS X. SO far, so good.

I think that you should start evaluating the software, as any computer that has electricity to it, and a valid OS, is prone to some sort of infection.

Be aware that VIREX from McAfee still disrupts Palm OS operations on a Macintosh.

Christian

Hello Cee,

Please, for the sake of completeness, go to the other thread and explain what was done to correct your password problem.

As for the Acrobat Question....

Acrobat costs anywhere from $150 - $300 per license depending on what you needs are. Distiller is part of Acrobat Professional.

You may notice that OS X offers you, inside of the print dialogue box, the option of saving to a file as .pdf (almost all OS X programs offers this. While I have not seen Quark for OS X in my personal possession, I have to assume it is there). This method of creating a .pdf file is not the same as using Acrobat.

Distiller
Distiller is a program that comes along with Acrobat that converts postscript files to .pdf files. You create those postscript files by saving them with the printer driver, and then running Distiller as a separate process. For a Quark documents that I did in the past under OS 8 and 9, I would run distiller and get really nice smooth and efficient Acrobat files.

So, to answer your question, for quality control purposes, I would track down Distiller, and fine-tune the halftoning and other options to make crisp and clean output documents.

For those of you reading along, I think there is some better Desktop Publishing software (DTP) out there called Ragtime. Go look it up on the internet... and it is free for personal use, and it is …

Hello Martin,

Do the OS X Macs disconnect after being idle for a few minutes? Are we talking minutes or hours? If the users are working on the computers, do they still drop off?

Thanks,

Christian

Hello,

Hard to guess with what information you provided. Boot up off of a CD-ROM, but do not do any installs or maintenance. Just have it sit at the Welcome! screen for a while. If it maintains the bright clear picture, then you have a software problem with the OS X installation on your hard drive. If the monitor is dim, and you see no changes, I would argue a hardware problem.

By the way. Mac is not MAC. We are not an acronym. Mac. :)

Christian

Hello,

"Classic" to me, implies that you are running OS X, and are running a OS 9 program in the Classic environment. Let's say I was running a good game called RISK! that was written for OS 9, and I booted into OS X. When I run RISK!, it loads up the Classic environment, and I go to war.

When loading up OS 9 by itself (just as you would have done in 1998), it is not called Classic. You are running pure OS 9.

What you are going to want to do is boot into OS 9, either by having a OS 9 partition on your hard drive, or by telling the System Preferences --> Startup Disk to boot up your "classic" folder. You will not be able to just boot the OS 9 CD-ROM, because you are going to need to access your PlusOptimizer software, and you cannot eject a CD-ROM if it has the live system on it. If you have a CD-ROM Burner, you might find it easiest to burn a startup OS 9 CD-ROM with the Optimizer program on it.

OF course, you did make your backups already, right?

Christian

Hello Bobland,

Thank you for visiting, and letting us know. While I am not the only Mac expert on DaniWeb, we are all volunteers here. I try to service for an hour and a half every day. Sometimes, I am gone for 2 days here and there. But the staff here is a team, and if the question is in the realm of the normal (you didn't, for example, ask us to hardware hack your VCR), there is a good bet of a response within a day or two. :)

With a Dual OS Machine -- Mac or Win or Linux -- The operating system of the hour is the one that needs to be investigated. For example, at work, I dual boot to have a test environment, and a live environment, all on the same box! Links and changes to one do not affect the other, unless they access a common file system.

As for the ethical concerns... that is just a no-no, and such conduct will get him blacklisted. Anchors like that are very hard to unload. Professional character is most important.

Christian

Hello,

I like Apple's utility, and also Toast. Toast also works well with my PC-Labeled, but mac loving DVD burner.

Christian

Hello Cee,

In a private email, you told me that you were working with OS X 10.3, meaning Panther. You also mentioned to me that you were using OS 9, and are struggling with OS X.

OS X is a mature, modern operating system that makes users accountable for their actions. Gone are the days of "one user fits all" computing that OS 9, your Apple II, and your Windows 95, 3.1 and Commie 64 all did. Today, we login: XP, OS X, Win 2000, and Linux.

That said, I am confused where you exactly installed a password. You had to setup a username / password combination to log into OS X, and that did not just magically happen -- when running the installer, you (or the person who built it) assigned a password to the computer. So I am wondering if by chance you did something to your keychain, or perhaps installed a program that you have to login to, or maybe you are referring to a dialup internet connection that you have to assign a username password too.

Now, it is possible that you at one time had the computer setup to automatically log you in. Under OS X 10.3 (panther), there is a Security control panel that has a check box to allow the computer to automatically login. When in this mode, OS X gives itself the proper username / password combination... the authentication engines are still in place. // Sidenote: Win XP …

Hello,

I would enter the numbers into an array, and then have the computer do a bubble sort on them. With the Bubble, the largest value will be on the top ( array[0] ) and the largest value would be on the bottom ( array [5] ) .

Code for a bubble sort is around the internet somewhere. Granted, it is not the most efficient code, but you are looking at only a handful of elements.

Then you can whack off the [0] and the [5] elements, and add the rest and get your answer.

Christian

Hello,

Most likely, it will not allow you to format an active system partition. What does that mean? It means that if you booted your computer XP, and it was booted from the C:, it will not allow you to format that partition.

A format is a disk operation that completely initializes (blanks / clears / erases) a partition. I say "partition" because you can have more than one partition on a physical hard disk, and a format cannot jump a partition barrier.

Specifically to your question, it would be possible (although unlikely, but I did this as an exercise to teach a young grasshoper that his bag of marbles was missing a few) to have two partitions: a C and a D. You could then put XP on D: and boot from there, and in that particular case, you could format C: and have the operating system remain (because it is on D:)

Christian

Hello,

It might help to know what type of calculator program you are looking for. You might want to structure it so that the user has to input a function...

Welcome to the Calculator Program.
 Would you like to Add, Subtract, Divide, or Multiply (A,S,D,M)?
 
 You chose to _
 
 Please enter in your 1st Number:  __
 Please enter in your 2nd Number: __
 
 Your answer is:  ____
 
 Would you like to calculate another?

Now, keep these things in mind:

* DO NOT ALLOW YOUR COMPUTER TO DIVIDE BY ZERO. That could crash out the computer, and give the user a nasty message. Put a check in there to ensure that b <> 0

* Be careful with the imaginary numbers. Review how they work.

* If you have to add trig functions, then make sure they follow the rules too.

* How are you going to handle exponents?

Some enhancement ideas:

* Implement a memory function that can store a value to be compared with later.

* Implement a small array, say 25 numbers, that you can average together or sort out (kinda like an adding machine thing).

Christian

Hello,

I *think* that is is going to be determined by how many threads you have enabled on your webserver, such as apache or IIIIS. You might be more interested in how many threads may be open instead of a client. For example, I could be 1 client, but accessing 10 different pieces of information on your website. Or 1 client downloading a bunch of little .gif files at the same time.

Christian

Hello,

Why would a disk optimization program be concerned with the display? That to me is a bad design. Granted, no one is going to run CAD software in 640 x 480, but a display being too large?

The wait from Jaguar to Panther is justified -- an OS level definately can affect disk access parterns, perhaps file locking, and so forth.

But not the display.

Christian

I still do not like the idea of two IP numbers on the NIC. Really messes up routing and other things, like subnetting and collisions and sorts. Ugly.

Be nice, and kindly clean up your network. You mentioned that you were having problems with the router device. What was going wrong?

Christian

Hello,

I found a few firewall products for the Mac:

http://personalpages.tds.net/~brian_hill/brickhouse.html

http://www.sunprotectingfactory.com/sunShield/shield_news.html

http://www.intego.com/netbarrier/

You can give them a try and see how they work.

I still do not like the idea of one NIC having two IP addresses assigned to it.

Christian

Hi,

What are the contents of the copy? What are you selecting when you hit cmd-c or cmd-v? What I am getting at is are you trying to copy a graphic into a text cell, or something strange like that.

I have also found out that in XL that you do not want to select "destination cells".

Christian

Hello,

I see two solutions here.

1) Replace the switch with a router. This will allow your router's input port to take the 24.x address, and will allow the output to be on 192.x network. If you are going to take this approach, then I would go after a wireless router, as if there is a laptop in your future, make the investment now, and simply disable the RF portion of the network. I suggest the wireless router from Buffalo Technologies. I avoid Linksys.

By doing this, you are setting up NAT, and have a clean networking environment. The router will handle NAT, so that you can turn on / off your machines without one relying on the other.

You will need to setup some port forwarding on the router, so that SSH, web, and other Packets reach the proper computer. Matter of fact, you could have two ports: 10022 and 10023 both listening to ssh.... one goes to the Mac, the other to your Windoze box.

2) You can insert a second NIC into your G5 computer, and run one NIC on 24.x and the other NIC on 192.x Treat the first NIC as an untrusted device, and firewall it. Treat the second nic as a trusted device, and let it flow.

3) Build a cheap linux server and put that between your cable modem and the switch. Run IPTABLES there. Host your private website there. Route from there.

I think real …

Hello,

The usual things apply: OS version, Office version. How are you trying to paste? Please let us know the exact steps.

Christian

Hello,

I will need to see if OS X will obey the standard UNIX / Linux firewalling commands (iptables / ipchains / ifwdm?) If so, you should be able to write rules (yeah, probably by hand, but that is what the keyboard is for!)

I think you have a flaw in your network idea though. You mention sharing the cable modem, and that implies that you want to do network address translation (NAT) or something that we call routing. You cannot route over a single interface. That doesn't work.

I'd like to see a network diagram of what you are proposing to do. Please draw up something in ASCII art, or plop a quick attachment and draw out what you are trying to do. Something about a Picture == 1000 words.

Christian

Hello,

The iMac was designed to be a consumer - oriented computer with limited expansion options. It was based on the ideas that drove the original Macintosh back in the 1980's.... simple form, all in one design, detached keyboard and mouse.

I do not think these iMacs have an expansion slot. So you would remain with USB1, which I believe supports an iPod.

Christian