convert DVD – vob files

I have written about video converter software in one post. Up to now, my favorite software is Internet Video Converter that is free, simple, complete, fast converting process and give good quality.

A little problem comes out when we work with DVD with several VOB files. Of course we can convert it one by one and then use another burner program to create VCD. If we want to play the mpg using media player, we can use play list to run one after the other. To merge it to be one file mpg only, we can use another program also such as windows movie maker. Easy, but a long process and we can’t avoid the lost of video quality.

After trying with some possibilities, I found out that for people like me who often process videos, worthwhile enough to use the paid software such as Nero. To process videos, we use Nero Vision that is included in Nero package. The newest version is Nero 8 with price about $100.

I myself have Nero 7. Start “Nero Vision” –> “make movie”, then I can directly use the VOB files –> next –> export movie.

The advantage is, it can work directly from VOB clips. Most other video editing software (specially the free ones) work only with avi or sometimes with mpg and wmv (such as Windows Movie Maker). Every process of video conversion cost the quality. With Nero, I get a good video quality result.

By the way, Nero has a lot of other features. Yes it spends 459 MB of my hard disk, but then I can take out some other software from my computer. … any how, if you’d like to give up the one hundred dollars.

Audio in MS Power Point

With insert Audio, we can add music in our Power point presentation. Sometimes, when we transfer that PPT file, the music is no more there because the audio is not embedded to the file, it is only linked.

There is some limitations you should know to embed an audio:

1. The audio will be embedded only if it is in wav file.
2. The audio file size should not more than what is set in your file. For PPT 2003, go to “tools” –>”options” –> tab “general” –> set “link sound with file size greater than …”. In PPT 2007, “insert” –> sound –> from file –> (after choose the file)OK. Then select the icon of audio in the slide, you can see a menu “sound tools” on the top of the menu bar. Click it, set the “max sound file size”. For both PPT2003 and PPT 2007, you can set maximum 50 MB.

If you don’t fulfill those two conditions, the ppt will sound only if you have the audio file in the correct link as set in the ppt file. Usually, to make easy, put the ppt and audio files in the same directory.

Wav file is a raw audio file, so usually it has big size, not as mp3. To deal with this, first make the audio as mp3, then do “RIFF wav header” to mp3. It means, the mp3 is encapsulated to appear as if wav. To do this, you can use some free software. I use CDex that you can download it here.

My website is hacked!!

This afternoon, one of my clients report that when she opened my website, came out plenty links of porn related links. I was not believe it until I did it and I saw it. I was shocked!! How come!! I run to other computers, open the website – reload the page – but nothing!! In the beginning I thought it might be her computer was attacked by spyware. It was with Internet Explorer. So I installed Firefox (version 3)… Clean!! Nothing worse came out in the page. Then I reinstall the IE7. The horrible links are still there!! No way, I went to my computer, checked my file in the webserver and the second time I got shocked. The index file was changed. I noticed it from the “modified date”. So I upload the original one after download the “infected” page. I went back to the problematic computer and this time, that links disappeared. But I got worry when I clicked to the next page, it came again. I back to my webserver and checked more detailed. The third shocked!! Almost all index page are changed, in all my three website (domain). O my God!!

I open the infected index file in notepad++ to look for the “embedded” inserted by the hacker. I could not find. I was almost frustrated, when finally I found through dreamweaver a small php script in the end of the files. This php script will include another script file (one only in one website) which bring the list of those horrible links. This modus is in two of my websites. In the other one, a much smaller website, the links were directly put in the index page.

So, I deleted all the embedded files by hackers, and reload all the infected index files. That is the emergency steps I could do. Since one of the embedded files links to an italian site, I was convinced that they might hack my websites by stealing the password through my computers. (my webserver is in USA). So I scan my computers, first with Adware from Lavasoft and then with Spyware Doctor of PCtools. I really found hundreds of infected files, despite of having Symantec End Point installed in my computer. Among the infections, I suspect much on Trojan.ProAgent. The most important thing, I changed all the administrator password, and I will change them more often.

Based on the changed file’s data, the hacking might be done on July 17,2008 – almost 2 weeks ago. But the effect is already so bad. My website gone from google and yahoo search!! I had made much efforts to get in the top ten rank. ……. Yeah! Ruthless people is always exist.

why not using free email service?

In our department, we have at about 30 mail users and we have our own domain. We have a website, so we have that mailboxes for free.

This time, I would like to talk about  “why using our own domain name for our emails?”. We are not a commercial organization, we don’t need prestige. We also don’t need to control our members’ emails like in a company. So, why?

1. For the facility of POP.

Yes, this was the strongest reason. Some email client software could help such as YPOP, up to now but there is still many problems. Yahoo changes their technology many times, and everytime create problem to that software and need to be fixed. Now, Gmail has the best feature. It has POP and even IMAP for free!! I have tried it. Excellent. Long time ago, Yahoo gave POP3 for free also but now it is only for the pro. Yahoo pro cost $19.99/year/user. Will Gmail give that facilities for free forever? No guarantee, I think.

2. All are in our control.

We can arrange our mailboxes as our need. We can use features that usually only in the pro ones, such as forwarder, etc. Wrong email address can be directed to the administrator so can still be managed well. This is not a matter of “controlling” but “managing”

3. Better email address, easily memorized by other since they have the same domain and the domain is specific ours. It is not only a matter of prestige.

So far, that are the three basic advantage. If you don’t need those, I suggest you to use the free one. I have made some search :

1. The storage : Since May 2007, YahooMail give unlimited storage for free. Gmail give 7GB. Others mostly give 1 GB. In fact, we would not need more than 1 GB.

2. POP3: I found only Gmail give POP3 and IMAP for free. ISPs give free only if using their internet connection, such as Libero.it

3. SPAM: Yahoo and GMail provide good AntiSpam, and their AntiSpam depend more to the user. So, there is almost no case that Yahoo/ Gmail refuse emails from certain domain or IP.

4. Yahoo and Gmail almost never refused by others’ ANTISPAMMER. My IP refused AOL emails.

You can see a review of some free-emails here.

spyware can make trouble in your Microsoft Word

One of my client’s computer had problem in her Microsoft Word. She could not insert Clip Art in Microsoft Word. If she tried to click Insert –> Picture –> Clip Art, then the Word freezed. I thought it is the problem of the MOffice. I was about to uninstall and reinstall, when I saw in the monitoring page of the proxy server that her computer sent out as big as more than 400 MB, while the other computers in the network would send not more than 100 MB. The computer has Symantec End Point Client installed. Another symptom, the internet browser open very slowly – Internet Explorer and also Firefox.

As usual, I run Adware free from Lavasoft. I was schocked when it found not less than 100 infections by Application.Tracking Cookies; Adware.Adversity; Spyware.Known_Bad_Sites; and Trojan.ProAgent.

To make sure, I installed and run intelli-scan by Spyware-doctor from PCtools. And it gave another shock with Trojan.downloader.VB.AWJ; Trojan.PWS.Tanspy; Trojan.downloader.small.EIH; Adware.Weird_on_the_web and Adware.Maxifiles. I tried to run the full-scan and still found Rogue AntiSpyware Product.

The next day, I tried to run again the Spyware-doctor, but it couldn’t. Seems the Symantec doesn’t like it. When I was installing Spyware-doctor, Symantec give “tempered alert”. So, I uninstall Symantec. Anyhow, it is clean. The internet browser open fast and smoothly and I was surprised when I insert the clip art in MS Word, it works also smoothly and fast.

You can download free spyware-doctor starter edition here.

As my conclusion, malware disturbs the internet browsing and might also disturb Microsoft Office. If you have problem with your application, check first the possibility of malware infections.

contact list from outlook to excel or word

I was asked so many time about this, “how to transfer my contact addresses to be a list in excel or word”.

This is the way:

1. Open your outlook, click “go” –> “contact”
2. Click “File” –> Import and Export
3. choose “Export to a file” –> click “next”
4. choose the type of file you want, for example “Microsoft Excel”
5. If this is for the first time, it might ask to install it, since this facility is not automatically installed when you install the Microsoft Office – Outlook. Click OK for confirmation.
6. You will get a dialog box asking the directory/name file you want to save. Fill it and click ok.

It as simple as that, isn’t it? This will export all field in your contact, even empty. So, you might have to do formatting quiet much. But if you want to install this data to other outlook (maybe in other computer), don’t need to reformat.

task manager has no menu nor tabs bar

I wonder about the task manager window of one of my clients’s computer. When I push ctr+alt+del, the window comes out is only the applications window without any menu nor tabs bar.

To solve it, just double click anywhere in the frame of the window, it will come to normal again.

setting the language

Once I used the laptop of my friend. It was bought in China. So, everything in China. When I open the Microsoft Office (English version) and start typing, the chinese letters came out. As usual, I go to control panel –> region and language setting –> change the language default and also the keyboard. Then I go to Microsoft Office tool and change the language editing there. Now, everything went well with the Office applications.

But, when I opened the Internet Explorer, it goes always to the chinese webs, even the google search web brings to the chinese letter web. If you use Internet Explorer, set the language in “Tools” –> “Internet Option” –> “general”tab –>language. In Firefox, go to “Tools” –> “Option” –> “Advanced” –> language. There you can change your language preference.

Canon BJC 80 in Windows XP

The driver of Canon BJC 80 printer is included in Windows XP installation CD and installed automatically together with the Windows installation. Usually you even don’t need to use “Add Printer Wizard” to install this printer, since the plug and play system will recognize and install it automatically.

Unfortunately, I had problem with my fresh Windows royale installed computer. The computer recognize the new hardware connection but it failed to install it. When I use “Add Printer Wizard” and choose BJC85 (BJC 80 use the same driver with BJC85 for winXP), it stacked in “Printer Driver is not installed”.

Solution: Use “Add Printer Wizard”. After choosing BJC85, click “Have disk” and put the Windows XP disk. Then follow the installation process. It was happening that it had difficulty to find one file but I managed it by direct the process to D:\i386 folder.

Problem of Windows XP SP3

This is the third time for me installing sp3 upgrading. First was very smooth, might be some problems but I didn’t recognize it. It is in a relatively “clean” computer with windows XP SP2 – with only 512 RAM DDR. Second, was on July 20, 2008. You can read how it was in my blog at that day.

This time, I work with P4 computer 1GB RAM DDR2, but it is quite much used. I was to set a new user and delete the old one.

After uninstalling the unused programs, I install the sp3 upgrade installer. Three major error I found is:

1. ReBoot continuously. Even in safe mode, it reboot again and again right after the logo Windows comes out. My solution is:

• I push F8 while starting reboot. Then in the safe mode choice screen, I chose for “not restart on system error”. Then I know the problem, it error C0000139 regarding file GDI32.dll. So I can google how to solve it.
• Boot from windows CD and go to repair option.
• While the command prompt came out, type: copy c:\windows\servicepackfiles\i386\gdi32.dll c:\windows\system32\gdi32.dll
• If you are not sure, keep a backup copy of the old gdi32.dll
• Click “yes” to confirm the overwrite.
• Reboot normally –> Windows boot normally.

2. Remote Desktop Connection does not work. When I run the program, it says ” remote desktop pre-installed software is expired”.

• I copied from the well run other win xp-sp2 computer, files mstscax.dll and mstsc.exe from directory C:\WINDOWS\system32
• I overwrite those same files of the problematic winXP-sp3
• The Remote Desktop Connection work again.

3. Microsoft Office failed to be installed, trying to find some installer files but could not. Lazy to uninstall – reinstall, I tried to do Administrative Installation: by run D:\office2003\setup /a Seems the installation went on but the symptom still there. Finally, I uninstall and reinstall, then everything goes well. I am not sure if this is a problem of changing the user or upgrading to the WinXP-SP3

Thank God.