A: I would love to make that box go away with 2002, which is what I'm using right now, but I can't do it to save my life. If you think there is a possibility of a virus that is preventing scanning, the quickest way to check is to do a Live Update session and see if it is working. If a virus has disabled your virus checker, it will certainly disable the update features. That frequently is the best early-warning detection method for telling that a virus has gotten into your system. If the update goes OK, you should be in pretty good shape; don't worry about it.

Q: I have a question about viruses. Someone, I'm not sure who, is sending me the Klez32 virus, and my Norton picks it up and quarantines it. I don't know what else to do with it, and I'm afraid of it. Is there any way, before I get rid of it, to find out who sent it to me?

A: The Klez is really nasty. Can you find out who sent it? Yes, but you need a PhD. in reading e-mail headers. If you get the Klez, it goes into your email address book and selects one name. It does not send itself to that one name; it replicates itself and sends itself to every other name in the address book, using that one name as the return address.

So your good friend Joe doesn't get the virus, but everybody whose alarm bells go off because they get the Klez, will reply to the infected e-mail and send 5,000 emails to poor Joe. If you can read the headers you can at least find out what server and what system the e-mail is being sent from. You can't always backtrack to the individual user or mailbox, because of the way Klez spoofs the addresses. And it isn't really worth it. All you can do is wait it out until your friend's computer croaks.

If you don't fix a Klez infestation fairly quickly, it will render Windows inoperable. So either the guy will get his computer fixed or it will quit working, and in either case you will stop getting them. But you won't know who it was until you are sitting at a Christmas party drinking some eggnog and somebody says, "You know, my computer just suddenly stopped working." And you'll say, "So, you're the one!"

Q: I have Windows 98SE, Norton 2001, and Windoc. Every time I run Windoc I get an error message that says "acme/com section of your Windows registry contains one or more invalid entries. You can fix this." I fix it, and then next time I run Windoc it's there again. What does that mean?

A: It means that you have a configuration problem in Windoc and it modifies your registry every time you start it. Uninstall it and reinstall it, and hopefully that will fix it.

R: It's the little box in Norton System Works.

A: Then uninstall and reinstall System Works. Whatever the program is that's causing that, uninstall it and reinstall it. Otherwise it's a bug in the program; contact Symantec. But Windows 98SE is common enough that it shouldn't be something that happens to everyone who uses SE.

Q: I'm running Windows 98SE and Norton 2002. I installed it one one machine and it worked properly. I took it off of that machine and put it on another. Am I going to have a problem with re-reregistering it?

A: No. Even if you install it on both machines, and keep it running on both machines and continue to do Live Updates on both machines, they will both work. There is no mechanism in Symantec's programs to determine how many registered users there are. That probably will change, but at present that is the case. You won't have any problems with moving it. And I applaud you for taking it off the old one; that's what you're supposed to do.

Q: There were some comments earlier about SystemWorks 2003. Is there anything that you have seen that warrants the update from 2002 to 2003?

A: No. I looked at the list of features, which is fairly small, and there wasn't anything in there that I particularly wanted. That's why we're still installing 2002 on customer computers, unless they ask for 2003. My objection is that it is costing more and more to upgrade and keep your definitions up to date. They drop support for older versions sooner than they used to, forcing you to upgrade sooner, and then the upgrade cost is more. And I don't like selling customers 90-day virus subscriptions. So we're using 2002 until they have one-year subscriptions on the 2003. They're not out yet for OEM. I understand the retail version is out, but it is four times as much money as system builders pay. We need to buy the OEM to install - legally, I can't even install a retail version; you have to do it.

Q: If someone buys a computer today and gets the XP operating system, I understand that there is a black box, a switching box, so that you can continue to use your old monitor, your old printer, and so forth, and, therefore, not have to transfer all of your programs over to the new operating system. How does this work?

A: As described, it doesn't. You can use almost any reasonably recent monitor, mouse, and keyboard with XP. XP isn't any more finicky than Windows Me or 2000 about monitor hardware, mouse hardware or keyboard hardware. However, if you get a new computer, not an upgrade, all of your programs will have to be reinstalled in Windows XP. And you will not be able to migrate your settings on your old programs. You will need to get the disks and reinstall them. The reason for that is that all the programs will require registry settings. When you do the install, they change the pointers to the locations of the files, and all the rest of that stuff, and those pointers have to be installed in the registry. There is no way to get them into the registry other than going through the install process.

However, if you upgrade from an older Windows version to Windows XP, then the registry settings will all still be there, because to a certain degree, the registry is the same across all the Windows platforms from Windows 95 on.

The problem with that is that of all the Windows systems that we have had in the shop, XP is the most difficult to upgrade. Windows 95 was a much, much easier upgrade from Windows 3.1 than Windows XP is over Windows Me or 98 or whatever you're running.

We have ended up having to reformat the hard drive and start over on a number of occasions, and when you look at the entries in Microsoft's Knowledge Base to help you upgrade, it's clear that they have had a lot of issues with it also. An upgrade is rarely clean and uneventful.

In addition to that, Windows XP is extremely intolerant of hardware that is not standard. By standard, Microsoft means that it is something that they tested and it is certified to work according to Microsoft standards. Particularly if you have something as old as Windows 98, the standards that Microsoft was publishing when Windows 98 came out are completely different from the ones they have now. Things that were compliant with 98 standards may not be compliant with XP standards and will not run.

If you have an older computer, the chances of your having all the hardware in it compliant with XP are very slim. There is a thing called the Hardware Compatibility List on the Microsoft Web site that you can check. You have to be very careful about model numbers - XYZ3512C is not the same as XYZ3512CE. But if all the model numbers of everything you have is certified to work, you can give the upgrade a try, but back up all your data first, because if it doesn't work you will have to reformat.

Q: The vendor who built my desktop computer last year installed Windows Me as the operating system. I'm having increasing instances where the computer will not shut down normally but must be rebooted and then shut down. A common error message states "error has occurred in ICSMGR" even if I have not been connected to the Internet during the session. How can I fix this?

A: The ICS Manager is the Internet Connection Sharing Manager. It allows you to route one computer through another and out to the Internet. If you start having problems with that, basically it's an uninstall and reinstall of the ICS. It actually isn't very difficult to do, but something got hosed in the settings.

The SPCUG AnswerGuys Take One!
Q: I have a problem with MS Word 2000 (SP3) hanging up when I hit File, Print. If I use the print toolbar button, it prints right away but by doing it this way I can't change print properties. The task bar flashes and eventually I see ~$FileName as a new file. It doesn't happen on every Word file I have or every time with the same document. I am running Windows 98SE and have a Lexmark Z53 printer.

A: Sounds to me like Word doesn't like something about this one document. But let's work on why the task bar flashes, first. That happens when a new dialog window pops up *behind* another window.

I'm hoping you have a Quick Launch bar next to the Start button. On that QL bar is an icon for the Desktop (move the mouse cursor over it and it says "Show Desktop"). If you don't, then on a blank area of the task bar, right-click the mouse. You can accomplish what I want you to do by doing this: On the small menu that pops up, click "Minimize all windows."

When you next see the task bar flash, click on the Show Desktop icon (or the other method). Then click it again. When all the windows come back, the hidden dialog window should now be in front of the Word window. Once we see what's going, then we can work on how to fix it.

The ~$filename is a temporary file created by Word for its own purposes. It's a file you should not concern yourself with. Word uses these types of files to hold images or other inserted objects while you are editing the document, and also to "lock" the file against other users (like on a network) from being able to open the same file.

R: When I right click on a blank area of the task bar and click on "Minimize all windows" and then click "Undo minimize all," I get the regular print dialog screen and from there I can print the document fine. This happens on more than just one document. What's the next step?

A: Ok, now that we know that the print dialog window is opening behind the main Word window, we need to figure out why that happens. It is not a problem with any of your documents. It is a problem caused by one of two things: 1) A bona-fide problem with SP3. If this is the case, there is nothing you can do other than just work around it, or 2) some other program is interering with the proper operation of Word and Windows.

With respect to #2, if you are using Norton Anti-Virus, try this-- Open Norton Anti-virus 2002/2003 and click on Options. In Other, Miscellaneous, uncheck "Enable Office Plug-in." In NAV 2001, click on Options, then General. The Office Plug-in only pertains to Office 2000/XP.

You imply that you do not have a Quick Launch bar. This problem also seems to manifest itself if you start Word from an icon placed on the Quick Launch bar instead of using the "New Office Document" button off the Start button.

Actually, this problem has been around since the first release of Office 2000 back in 1999. It happens on Win98 through WinXP. It doesn't happen to everybody, and no one has figured out why it happens nor how Norton Anti-virus complicates matters.

If you are not using NAV, then we need to look elsewhere.

R: Your last suggestion about un-checking the "Enable Office Plug-in" in Norton Anti-Virus appears to have fixed the problem. I have not been able to duplicate the problem since changing the option. I will keep my fingers crossed.