CompuNotes - We now have forums on the website! See below! Notes from The Cutting Edge of Personal Computing ISSN: 1525-4534 May 18, 2002 Issue 184 +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= To subscribe, send an e-mail to compunotes-subscribe@topica.com To unsubscribe, send an e-mail to compunotes-unsubscribe@topica.com or send an e-mail to listserv@peach.ease.lsoft.com with the following SIGNOFF COMPUNOTES-L +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= Visit our Family of Sites ========================= GetFreeReports: Tons of Information -- FREE! (http://www.getfreereports.com) Jokes-N-Stuff: Your daily humor web page. (http://www.jokes-n-stuff.com) YALD and Internet Notes - A Great Blog (http://www.yald.com) Become a Friend of CompuNotes and Get Free Advertising for Your Site! ===================================================================== http://www.compunotes.com/friends.htm Get Free Support for your PC or Internet Connection =================================================== Stop by the CompuNotes forums and let us help you work the troubles your PC is facing. Suffer no more. :-) (http://www.compunotes.com/forums.htm) CONTENTS 1=> This Week's Notes, Join the CompuNotes Team, By Patrick Grote, mailto:pgrote@compunotes.com 2=> This Issue's Winner! Clickables: 3=> The Payphone Project and No More AOL CDs Reviews: 4=> Product: MYOB Plus v11 for Windows, business Reviewed By: Don Hughes, mailto:dhtech1@sympatico.ca 5=> Product: eMailTrackerPro & VisualRoute, internet Reviewed By: Paul Schneider, Ph.D., mailto:paul@studio5d.com 6=> Product: PerfectDisk 2000 v5, utility Reviewed By: Howard Carson, mailto:agitater@compunotes.com 7=> Product: Bitter Java by Bruce A. Tate, book Reviewed By: Songmuh Jong, mailto:songmuh@yahoo.com --- To turn a friend on to this mailing, go to: http://go.MailBits.com/Tell.asp?611002.2 --- 1=> This Week's Notes, By Patrick Grote, mailto:pgrote@compunotes.com You obviously like your PC and the internet as you are a CompuNotes subscriber. You have great taste as well, but we'll leave that for another column. CompuNotes is now looking for folks to join our team of writers. Yes, even you can be a big part of making the CompuNotes' magic happen week after week. What's in it for you? 1) Access to the latest software, hardware and books to review. 2) A compunotes.com e-mail address. 3) Complete bylines in each of your reviews or articles. 4) Prominent mention on our site under the STAFF section. 5) A resume builder for work. Who isn't impressed by, "Authored several technology reviews for a major online publication."? 6) Fun. Yes, it is fun to be able to go into Google, type your name and see your article. We're looking for folks who'd like to review software, hardware, books or services. We're also looking for those people who have opinions to share and aren't shy about it. If you're interested in writing for CompuNotes, send an e-mail to writers@compunotes.com and we'll respond with the guidelines. If you have any questions at all, drop Patrick Grote a line at pgrote@compunotes.com or Howard Carson at agitater@compunotes.com. 2=> Winner! This week's winner: Tim Rose! Tim has won a $10.00 Amazon gift certificate. Would you like to win something just for subscribing? We give away a prize each and every week to one of our subscribers. Who knows, it could be you! You could win next week ... all you have to do is subscribe! 3=> The Payphone Project and No More AOL CDs The Payphone Project (http://www.payphone-project.com) The Payphone Project is one of the neater sites I have seen in a while. The idea is to compile a database of payphone numbers, but more importantly, describe where they are located. The main page is filled with payphone news. Who would have thought there was so much news concerning payphones? You also see pictures of actual payphones in their locations. The real meat of the site is the ability to choose a state or country and drill down to a local payphone. For instance, select the state of New York, you'll find phones in the Empire State Building Lobby and New York Public Library Main Branch among others. What this does is bring you the ability to reach out and touch someone for only the cost of a call. Where the site really shines is in locating payphones in places like the Antarctica, the Vatican and New Zealand. Countries such as Romania, China and Vietnam and featured with picture of their payphones. The site loads quickly and has no advertisements. If you're looking for a fun, out of the way place to stop on the internet you need to stop by The Payphone Project. No More AOL CDs (http://www.nomoreaolcds.com/) We all suffer from AOL CD overload. You get them in magazines, in the mail and even at the store. The questions you come up ... what use is there for AOL CDs? What can I do with AOL CDs? Well, NOMOREAOLCDS.COM's stated goal is, "To collect 1,000,000 unwanted AOL CDs from people like you. We'll then transport the 1,000,000 CDs in an armada of trucks or something and give them back to their rightful owners, AOL. We'll ask them to stop sending these unrequested, unwanted, and destined for landfill CDs." Can you imagine that? The crew is up to 26,062 with only 973,938 to go, but they only started in August of 2001. The site acts as an informative look at how they're doing, how to ship them CDs and FAQ section. If you're interested in sending them AOL CDs you can find the details here. http://www.nomoreaolcds.com/shipping.html. The site is a blast to look at and will make your day a little lighter! 4=> Product: MYOB Plus v11 for Windows, business Reviewed By: Don Hughes, mailto:dhtech1@sympatico.ca Requires: Pentium or compatible system, 32MB RAM, 40MB of hard drive space for program installation, approximately 35MB additional space for each data file, 16 bit color, 800x600 resolution, Windows 95 or later MSRP: $229.00 When we set up our company back in 1996, MYOB was the accounting software package we picked for our operation. The main reasons were its capabilities and how well the program worked for one of my clients. The client was not very computer illiterate and he wanted an easy-to-use, customizable accounting package which could handle Canadian accounting and banking, US accounting and banking, and track and build inventory. I became involved with MYOB when he called me to install the program on his network. I was so impressed with the software that I purchased a copy to set up our business accounting records. MYOB is a very user-friendly accounting package designed for end users who do not have accounting degrees. The program is primarily intended for small business use and management, not for tracking personal expenses. MYOB comes on one CD-ROM. Installation is simply a matter of following the on-screen instructions. After installation, click the desktop icon. The main screen appears and you can select Open (your company files), Create (new company file), Explore (sample company), What's new (in this version), and Exit. First time users select the Create>New company button. The setup process begins by typing in the company name, address, phone, fax and e-mail listings. The next screen prompts for the fiscal year, year-end date, conversion month, and number of accounting periods. Another window appears and users must confirm the dates before continuing. The next window sets up the accounts to be used in the business and users have three choices: 1) Start with one of the lists provided by MYOB, 2) Use a list of accounts provided by accountant, 3) Build your own list on MYOB. The default is number one and most users will use this setting to start MYOB. Users can set the general business category that they are in, or they can select "all" and pick from a list. The preset company business models which ship with MYOB Plus are very extensive and cover almost every type of business in the alphabet, from accounting to wholesale. The closest listing in MYOB Plus for our company is the business model for a "computer service bureau." When a user selects a particular model, MYOB creates all the appropriate accounts and codes for the company and saves the information to a data file. This file then becomes your business type and you can customize or changing anything you want to fit the business. Once the company data files are created another screen pops up giving two choices and a Set-up Assistant to either help customize the file or go directly to the Command Center to start entering transactions. Every function of MYOB is available through the command center including access to accounts, banking, sales, time billing, purchases, payroll, inventory and the card file. Users can add new categories for income and expense or delete accounts which are no longer required. The power of MYOB Plus accounting lays in the flexibility of the program for custom tailoring functions exactly to fit a particular business without the need for a software programmer or resident accountant. Users can also print out a chart of accounts and take this list to their accountants for help in deciding which accounts to keep, add or remove. One of the features I especially like in all versions of MYOB is that you can freely move around the print fields right on the monitor screen for customized printing. The on-screen set-up makes the adjustments for printing customized checks and invoices a breeze. To move the date, name, amount, etc., you just left click on the field in the customize screen and you can freely move, left, right, up, down, until you have the printout set to your printed forms size. Entering data into MYOB is very easy - all a user needs to do is click on the appropriate function in the command center. A mouse click on sales allows the user to enter the sale, print invoices, receive payment, or go to the transaction journal. In the transaction journal, all sales for a particular period or dates can be listed and reports printed. Small business owners can see at a glance balance sheets, profit & loss, profit margins, average costs and print charts in color. MYOB Plus helps owners grow their business, control expenses, pay employees, track inventory and taxes. MYOB Plus is user friendly and extremely easy to learn for accounting novices. In addition, MYOB Plus makes a good, low cost learning tool for students studying accounting or bookkeeping. Visit the MYOB web site and download or order the MYOB demo on CD and test-drive this amazing program. MYOB US, Inc. MYOB Product Web site: http://www.MYOB.com/us/ 5=> Product: eMailTrackerPro & VisualRoute, internet Reviewed By: Paul Schneider, Ph.D., mailto:paul@studio5d.com Requirements: Windows 98, Me, NT, 2000, or XP; Microsoft's Java VM build 5.00.3167 or later (free download from Microsoft); 800x600x256 color display, Microsoft's TCP/IP stack, an Internet connection. Versions available for Solaris 2.5 or later, Linux kernel 2.2.5-15, FreeBSD kernel 3.15-Release, and Mac OSX MSRP: $59.95 (bundle) I heard a rumor the other day that people are, on rare occasion, getting these strange new pieces of e-mail that are basically, well, junk. They've nicknamed it Spam Mail. Aaah, if that were only true; the "on rare occasion" part that is! Chances are you get your share of unwanted e-mail on subjects ranging from weight loss scams, natural health remedies, buy-it-now, and of course anything and everything to do with sex. Problem is, while these unsolicited e-mails often have an "unsubscribe" option, it often does not work. Wouldn't it be nice if you could figure out who was really sending you the spam? Visualware provides you with one way to become a clue-smith through the use of eMailTrackerPro and VisualRoute. These two programs take advantage of Internet registration services and the information that is already in your e-mail messages to hunt down where the message originated. The nicest part is that the results are all packaged in a visually appealing manner. And you thought Visualware was just a cute name! eMailTrackerPro examines the information in the header section of an e-mail message and provides an analysis of the results. One of the Spam messages I received recently was from an individual who claimed to be offering me low interest rates. Using eMailTrackerPro I was able to discover that the sender used Atlas Mailer 2.0 and attempted to hide his address with a fake one. I subsequently activated VisualRoute and discovered that, after bouncing around the U.S., he originated from one of the AOL domains. I then e-mailed the AOL Domain technical address provided by VisualRoute and informed them of the abuse. There was no satisfying death scream of a spammer, but it was nice knowing that I could do something to help curb this onslaught. eMailTrackerPro is designed for use with any e-mail program, but is particularly friendly to Outlook users. Upon installation the program adds a button that you can click to analyze your e-mail. Clicking the button launches eMailTrackerPro which then analyzes the open message. For those using programs other than Outlook 2000 and later, don't fear - the help menu provides the steps required to access, copy and paste the headers needed to analyze e-mail in older versions of Outlook and current versions of Eudora, Netscape Messenger, Pegasus, Hotmail, Yahoo and others. Visualware's flagship program VisualRoute is an essential companion for eMailTrackerPro. VisualRoute provides ping, Whois, and traceroute program capabilities. The big difference is that analysis is done quickly and the results are visual. The speed is obtained through the use of proprietary technology. VisualRoute simultaneously analyzes all of the hops between your computer and the sender's computer. Bypassing the traditional method of analyzing one hop at a time provides for a quicker traceroute. Although cool from an "I hate to wait" standpoint, the really neat feature is the visual presentation. Each hop along the way is displayed on a world map. The results provide you with each location your e-mail or Internet traffic was routed through and ultimately where it came from. These products have a couple downsides. In the case of eMailTrackerPro, if you are using something other than Outlook (like myself) there are extra steps you need to take to use the program - essentially manually copying and pasting e-mail header information from the message properties. It would be nice if the program provided direct support for Outlook Express, Eudora and a few other popular programs. For both programs the documentation and descriptions are a bit on the light side. For those familiar with the technology it will probably suffice, but for those who want to know what this all means, documentation is a bit skimpy. All in all I found these programs both refreshing and handy. The visual traceroute approach is a nice touch and I can see why different groups, such as law enforcement, are flocking to the program. Though I focused here on the ability to track down Spam, the tools are really a welcome addition to anyone's network utility box. Now if they would only build in a feature that would automatically send information about the Spammers to network providers (ISPs), we'd all join in the hunt! Visualware eMailTrackerPro & VisualRoute Product web site: http://www.VisualWare.com 6=> Product: PerfectDisk 2000 v5, utility Reviewed By: Howard Carson, mailto:agitater@compunotes.com Requires: Windows 2000, XP; any workstation or server running Windows 2000 and/or XP (FAT, FAT32 or NTFS). MSRP: US$49.95 (Workstation); $249 (Workstation/Server). Volume and upgrade pricing available. Fragmented program and data files are the normal result of computer use. Fragmentation occurs when a computer's file system cannot find enough uninterrupted space on a hard drive to create a file or increase the size of an existing file all in one piece. In such a situation the operating system has to store the file in pieces (sometimes hundreds of pieces or more) in various open locations across the hard drive. So who cares you ask? Well, YOU should care actually, because fragmentation slows down a computer's performance. It forces the computer to use extra resources to read and write files, take extra time to locate all the pieces of a document, program or other file, and it increase the amount of downtime and network maintenance. At its worst, a seriously fragmented hard drive can make your computer feel as though is slogging through cold molasses. A defragmentation utility like PerfectDisk puts files back together, allowing the operating system to read and use them faster, store them faster and maintain them using fewer resources (CPU time, RAM, disk space, etc.). Raxco Software's PerfectDisk 2000 is a disk defragmentation program which can be used on Windows 2000 and XP PCs, workstations and servers. PerfectDisk 2000 is marketed as an industrial-strength defragmentation solution for distributed Windows networks. It's being sold to very small businesses and the largest corporations and government departments and agencies. The software is designed to defragment data files in a single pass, defragment all 16 Metadata files including the Master File Table (MFT), consolidate free space and organize hard disks according to usage patterns, run a defraging schedule according to a preset, adjustable fragmentation level (threshold), provide a Network Scheduling Wizard to set, view and cancel schedules, and run offline automated defragmentation of the MFT and system files. This version of PerfectDisk also includes boot time defragmentation, network management, command line support and a few other tasty bits. Using PerfectDisk is child's play. Launch it, select a drive (or several drives) to analyze, and away you go. We tried the software on a couple of different servers running Windows 2000 Server and on three Pentium IIIs and a brand new Pentium 4. In all cases the results, particularly on an extensively fragmented mirror drive on one of the servers, were excellent. PerfectDisk is a speed demon on all but the most insanely fragmented hard drives (15%), clocking an average of 2 hours to defragment a 30GB drive. We actually took a chance during testing by leaving one of the servers to load up on fragments simply by disabling our current defragmentation software. We ran PerfectDisk on all four internal drives and restored the server to its usual zippy self, then set the PerfectDisk scheduler to run automatically once per day. The initial defragmentation run was flawless and the server has been percolating along quite nicely ever since. Trusting precious data to the whims and wiles of operating systems and hardware is all well and good considering today's more reliable offerings from Microsoft. But regular, automated defragmentation and backups will let you sleep through the night. PerfectDisk 2000 is a professional alternative to the best products currently on the market. Cons: The online help system is useful enough, but contains dozens of spelling and grammatical errors. Some of the text is downright confusing (or at least a bit of a giggle) including this line in the "General Settings" topic which reads: "You should never disable optimization unless you have another software product managing them." Reminds me of "All your base are belong to us" of Zero Wing fame. Pros: At least the online help system is detailed and thorough! The software works well - real well. Good balance of features and functionality - no feature bloat here. My IS Manager tried PerfectDisk on a dual-processor Windows 2000 Dell server we use for network backups (see above) and the results were flawless and fast. We didn't do a head-to-head comparison with any competing software but PerfectDisk does seem notably faster than many other products on the market. You can run PerfectDisk remotely on any Windows 2000 or XP computer on your network as long as PerfectDisk is already installed on the computer - very handy. Let's have a big cheer for a defragmentation utility able to easily handle typical size hard drives (1GB to 100GB), all the giant partitions out there (100GB up to 1 Terabyte!), and any size files (including 2GB+ videos). Let's have a big cheer for single pass defragmentation. Let's have another big one for parallel drive defraging (two or three drives at the same time). Raxco has it right. Highly recommended. Raxco Software Inc. PerfectDisk 2000 v5 Product web site: http://www.raxco.com 7=> Product: Bitter Java by Bruce A. Tate, book Reviewed By: Songmuh Jong, mailto:songmuh@yahoo.com Requires: Web Server and Servlet Container MSRP: US$44.95 ISBN 1-930110-43-X (Ebook edition: PDF format, 2 MB, US$13.50) This book discusses some design patterns and their issues and solutions for Java programming. The author uses VisualAge for Java, Websphere and DB2 as his tools, but the principles can be applied to any Java project. The codes are developed with JDK 1.2.2. Some, but not all, of them have been compiled, but not tested, in JDK 1.3.1. The author uses the term "antipattern" for a flaw in design. In addition, he attempts to have a unique descriptive term for each antipattern. If you jump from one chapter to another without specific order, you might be puzzled by all the new terms. Fortunately, the book has a good index on the keywords and the pages they are described. Before reading this book, one must understand that the author is a consultant. The writing style reflects his professional way of presenting idea and solutions. Instead of clear-cut sectioning as in other technical books, the author chooses a verbal style aimed at entertaining his readers. So you have to read the book very carefully to find the 'hidden' ideas and hints. Although the author's adds some burden to readers, keep in mind that Corporate America pays big bucks for this type of consulting. Reading this book is like having a consultant guiding you on various aspects of project design for server-side Java coding. You might save big bucks by reading this book instead of hiring a consultant. If you don't have the patience to read this book, then you may have to prepare to hire a consultant with high hourly fee. Because of the writing style, the author suggests that you skim the entire book to get an overview, then go back to specific chapters as needed. This is exactly what readers must do. This is not a book you can easily read from cover to cover unless you are a very experienced project manager who has already ploughed through server-side Java projects. Because this book discusses "antipatterns," at least half of the examples are examples of how NOT to code in your application. Do not blindly copy and paste the codes from this book to your projects! The best idea, servlets, is discussed in Chapter 3. The author points out that model-view-controller is not necessarily separated by the client/server boundary. Even the server-side codes can have view components. The same discussion extends into Chapter 4 in which JSP and coupling JSP with servlets are discussed. Everyone knows that resource pooling is a good technique for application design. The author expands on this idea in chapter 5 and discusses cache management. Notice that cache management is usually the domain of JVM or container supplier. Even specialized books on Servlet Programming do not say much about this, so the information is very useful. Memory Leakage is an important consideration when it comes to programming. The author pounds on this topic in chapter 6. Although JVM comes with Garbage Collection, there are still some instances where memory leaks can occur. It's nice to see a summary list of possible causes of memory leaks. Network connections are very expensive. The author tackles this subject and discusses connection pooling and other connection cleanup techniques in chapter 7. This chapter also includes the discussion of XML misuse and solution. XML is not discussed in a standalone chapter because the author calls it mini-antipatterns. It is not clear why XML is included only in this chapter. Enterprise Java Beans represents the most complex server-side Java design. The authors discusses it in chapter 8. This is the only chapter that comes with a complete application (something called BBS). This is also the only chapter in which the code examples were not developed by the author. The author concludes the book by looking at two aspects of general programming issues and solutions and how antipatterns can help project designs. Chapter 9 discusses programming hygiene and is not limited to Java programming - it is about bad programming practices in general, although some of the discussion is still Java-specific. Chapter 10 covers the topic of scalability and performance. Scalability is probably the most commonly mentioned and the most abused word in enterprise computing. It is not simply an issue of software design, it is also a matter of hardware distribution. The final chapter provides some parting thoughts and gives this book a sound conclusion. This book should not be treated as a regular computer science book. It is the recollection of a consultant's professional career in Java programming to-date. It can help new Java programmers avoid projects design flaws down the road. Experienced Java programmers and project leaders will benefit from this book by comparing the author's experiences with their own. It might even save the need for a consultant. If you are a Java programming consultant, this book should also be on your list. Manning Publications Bitter Java by Bruce A. Tate Product web sites: http://www.manning.com/tate/index.html +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= Publisher / Senior Editor: Patrick Grote, mailto:pgrote@compunotes.com Senior Editor: Howard Carson, mailto:agitater@compunotes.com Archives: ftp://ftp.compunotes.com/archives Website: e-mail: mailto:feedback@compunotes.com Want to Write for Us?: mailto:agitater@compunotes.com fax: (314) 909-1662 voice: (314) 909-1662 +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+= CompuNotes is: Available weekly via e-mail and on-line. We cover the PC computing world with comprehensive reviews, news, hot web sites, great columns and interviews. We also give away one software package a week to a lucky winner for just reading our fine publication! Never dull, sometimes tardy, we are here to bring you the computing world the way it is! Please tell every on-line friend about us! CompuNotes B440 1114 West Essex Ave. St. Louis, MO 63122 feedback@compunotes.com (C)2002 Patrick Grote ISSN: 1525-4534 *********************************************** The COMPUNOTES-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(R) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html