Friday, February 11, 2005
Ask ASCII: How can I
keep my computer safe?
By Logan Stack
staff writer
Dear ASCII,
I hear all the time that
Windows isn't secure but never
see a list of things anywhere that
I should be telling my friends and
family that they should do in
order to avoid problems. What
does a regular user need to do to
keep his/her computer reason
ably safe?
Linux lover with Windows
friends
Dear LLWWF,
The list of stuff to do would
depend on how safe you want
your computer to be. What I'm
going to offer is security advice
for average users. These are peo
ple who are connected to the
Internet and don't know too much
about the inner workings of the
computer. This is not for people
who run servers, such as those
who host web sites or who
administer private e-mail servers.
They need more advanced securi
ty measures.
First, the normal user needs to
have anti-virus software. If
you've got a Mac or Linux com
puter, you can get away with not
having any protection because
there are so few viruses written
for Mac or Linux. Many of those
won't work on a new computer.
But, if you run Windows, anti
virus software is essential
because so many new Windows
viruses are written every year.
Make sure your anti-virus soft
ware is up to date as well.
Your internet provider may
give you a year's worth of virus
protection when you sign up for
the service. But when it expires,
you need to either buy an exten
sion or buy a new program.
Protection from old viruses does
n't help when a new infection
starts spreading.
Sometimes you'll get a notice
that your anti-virus program isn't
being updated any longer. It's
wise to pay attention to that mes
sage and do something about it
by buying new protection, such
as Norton Anti-virus, which can
be purchased online from their
web site.
Chasez spreads the love
By Kate O'Hare
Zap2it.com
(KRT)
JC Chasez of the pop group 'N Sync has done a
little acting, mostly playing himself, including a
2001 animated appearance on Fox's "The
Simpsons." At 8:30 p.m. EST Friday on The WB,
he gets toon-ed again, in "A Scooby Doo
Valentine," a special episode of the WB Kids!
series "What's New Scooby Doo?"
And he's a lot happier with the way he looks this
time around.
"I've seen it 'The Simpsons' way," he says, "and
I have to say, the 'Scooby Doo' way was animat
ed a little bit better. They did a better job. It was
really cool. On 'The Simpsons,' you end up look
ing like a cousin of the Simpsons."
The storyline brings the Scooby Gang back
home to Coolsville for St. Valentine's Day, where
they soon discover that young couples are vanish
ing from Lovers' Lane. Complicating the mystery
are letters from a secret admirer, and look-alikes
for Daphne (who grouses that they couldn't get
"Scooby Doo" movie star Sarah Michelle Gellar
to play her), Fred, Velma, Scooby and Shaggy,
which are implicated in the kidnappings.
Meanwhile, Shaggy deals with the pangs of lost
love when he sees his ex-girlfriend, Rachel,
apparently blissfully happy with her new beau, JC
Chasez, whom she met by winning a date in a con
test.
"I loved the cartoon as a kid," Chasez says. "My
favorite character is Shaggy, which is pretty
funny, because in the story, him and I beef a little
bit. I thought, 'That's fun. I get to play an enemy
to probably my favorite character.'
Shaggy also represents a kind of mystery for
Chasez. "Everybody wanted to taste a Scooby
Snack, because they were good enough for
Scooby and for Shaggy, because Shaggy would
eat them, too. I would say, 'I wonder what they
taste like?' I don't know, man, they're probably
like graham crackers or something, if a dude can
eat them."
Reminded that Shaggy was not exactly a picky
rir
In addition, the normal user
needs to patch. A patch is a small
program you download to fix
stuff. On a regular basis,
Microsoft releases patches to fix
bugs and security problems with
Windows.
To patch your computer, you
need to be logged in as an admin
istrator. On Windows 95, 98 and
ME, there is no such thing as an
administrator, so any user can
patch. On Windows NT and
2000, there is an account called
"administrator." On Windows
XP, the first account created is an
administrator account, and any
accounts created thereafter may
or may not be, depending on how
you set them up when you creat
ed them. To patch NT, 2000 or
XP, you need to log out of your
current account by going to the
start menu and clicking on log
out. Then log into the administra-
tor account. Once you've got
administrator access, open
Internet Explorer and select
"Windows Update" from the
Tools menu. Microsoft makes the
patching process rather easy, in
about three clicks while follow
ing the on-screen instructions,
you'll be installing the patches.
Next, you should consider
anti-spy-ware software. If you
use Windows, you're going to get
ad-ware and spy-ware through
spam and browsing the Internet.
Spy-ware will slow down your
computer, give you popups at
sites which shouldn't have them,
track what websites you visit and
maybe even send others spam
using your Internet connection.
There are a variety of tools for
getting rid of these virus-like pro
grams. You can choose whichev
er you want. But you should run
them regularly. I use a combina
tion of LavaSoft's AdAware, and
Spy-Bot Search & Destroy; both
are free for home use.
Although daily would be ideal,
a weekly clean-out is more rea
sonable. That way the situation
can't degenerate too far, but run
ning the software isn't a time
consuming chore. Depending on
your Internet habits, you may not
even need to do it that often. If
you're like my father and use the
computer once a week, then you
eater, Chasez laughs. "True. He's like a human
garbage disposal."
Although he's used to being in a sound booth,
hearing his own voice, some aspects of animation
voice work were new for Chasez.
"It's pretty hilarious to see how people act in
front of the microphones while they're doing these
voices, because you have to create characteristics
just through your voice. In order to exaggerate
your vocal even more, you exaggerate your
actions more as well, so people look pretty funny.
"I had my moments where I looked pretty silly.
They just said, 'Look, have fun with it, and don't
worry.' It's a matter of letting down your inhibi
tions. You're afraid you're going to look foolish,
looking exaggerated and everything like that, and
they're like, 'Don't worry, the people won't see
you.—
As to whether there were cameras around for
the recording, Chasez says emphatically, "Oh, no.
No, no. No."
Bandmate Justin Timberlake has moved beyond
music to try serious acting, but Chasez isn't sure
that's for him.
"Right now, my main focus is music," he says.
"If the opportunity arises, and it's something I find
interesting, I might take a chance. I don't want to
do something that I'm not capable of and make a
fool of myself.
"I want to be artistic, and I want to push myself
to be more of an artist, but I'm not going to do
anything I don't feel like I can handle."
But he might do more animation-voice work.
"I'd love to. Maybe before going in front of a cam
era, that's something I'm comfortable with. As a
music artist, I'm not afraid to hear myself in head
phones. It might be fun."
When the special airs on Friday, Chasez says,
"I'm totally tuning in. I'll probably be working,
and I'll put the TV on in the studio, take myself a
nice break. I'll have a good laugh. I don't have any
problem laughing at myself."
Regarding his own Valentine's plans, Chasez
says, "I'll be working on Valentine's Day, but I'm
excited about it, so maybe I'll write a love song."
UD Nirri LIP
certainly needn't do it weekly. If
you constantly are browsing new
sites, especially ones which have
lots of popups, then you will
want to clean it out more often.
Perhaps monthly you should
de-fragment your hard disk. The
way Windows saves files can
leave your word documents scat
tered in small pieces about the
disk, when you de-fragment it
collects all the pieces and puts
them together in one place. This
doesn't help security, but it will
reduce the amount of time you
needed to open files and start
programs.
If you have broadband (cable
or DSL), then you should proba
bly get a router. A router for a
home Internet connection is a
small box which sits between
your computer and the modem. It
allows you to connect multiple
computers to your Internet con
nection at the same time and pro
vides a lot of security because no
outsider can directly access your
computer to do things like crash
your computer or scan your com
puter for vulnerabilities. They're
not expensive either.
More advanced users may
want to set up a software fire
wall. It provides additional pro
tections such as preventing spy
ware programs from reporting on
your computer activities. Entire
books have been written about
firewalls and basic firewall rules
probably need a whole book.
Some commercial firewall pro
grams (Black Ice Defender for
instance) don't let you configure
these rules and give you a gener
ic configuration which generally
works pretty well for most users -
making them easy to set up.
There really isn't a cure-all for
keeping your computer yours. It
takes periodic checkups to be
sure that viruses and spy-ware
haven't made it theirs. Get pro
tection, because if they take con
trol of your computer, taking it
back can be difficult!
Do you have a computer ques
tion? Ask ASCII! Send an e-mail
to lwsllB@psu.edu with "Ask
ASCII" in the subject line and
you may see your question in
next week's column.
`King of Queens' star gets
`Hitch'-ed to
By Chris Hewitt
Knight Ridder Newspapers
(KRT)
Usher has crunking, Michael Jackson has the
moonwalk and Kevin James has the Q -Tip.
James is in "Hitch," which is about a romance
coach for the dateless played by Will Smith. But,
for about five minutes, "Hitch" is hijacked by the
James Klutzatronic Dance Machine. His character
demonstrates his pathetic dance moves for Smith,
including an ear-fingering gesture called the Q-
Tip and a hand-rubbing motion called Starting the
Fire. All are rejected.
"You just look at me, and you know I can throw
it down, right? Me and getting the ladies - you can
see how smooth I am," jokes James, star of TV's
"The King of Queens," calling from a New York
hotel. "Those are pretty much my own moves,
which is pretty sad. That was my calling card with
the ladies, back in the day. That was what I had to
work with, that out-of-control thing, sort of like
onions falling out of a bag."
Smith and James improvised the dance scene
(they did lots of stuff that's not in the movie but
could be on the DVD), something James says
many stars wouldn't go for. "Some actors would
see another supporting actor getting laughs and
would shut it down immediately," says James,
declining to name names. "But Will encouraged
it."
The two were friends first, after a "Queens"
writer introduced them and they played golf.
Smith said they should work together; James fig
ured it was one of those when-pigs-fly situations.
But Smith called and James said yes to a tiny role
that, over the course of a movie's worth of impro
vised scenes, ended up being not-so-tiny. James
was thrilled because, despite six years on a hit sit
com, the movie offers were not exactly pouring in.
They weren't exactly even trickling in.
"It's hard to knock down doors, even if you've
been on a TV show for a while," says James. "It's
such a difficult transition to make, as you can tell
from all the TV actors who tried and didn't make
it in movies."
When James heard from Smith, he had just lost
the lead in the next film from Mike Judge, who
wrote and directed "Office Space." At the time, he
was bummed not to get the gig. Now, he's thrilled
he wasn't chosen because it would have prevented
him from doing "Hitch."
Speaking about his collaboration with Smith,
James uses the playing against someone who's
better than you makes you better sports metaphor.
The difference is, when he says working with
Smith is the comedy equivalent of playing golf
with Tiger Woods, James isn't speaking metaphor
ically. He actually has played golf with Tiger
Woods, and tips from Woods actually did make
Crossword
ACROSS
1 Capital on the
Nile
6 Uneven hairstyle
10 Alan of
"M"A'S'H"
14 Render void
15 Patriot Nathan
16 Midday
17 Loses one's cool
18 Right-hand man
19 Young horse
20 Conical abode
21 Players for $
22 Supplements,
with "out"
23 Lengthened
25 Ernie of golf
27 Graven image
29 Cartographer's
_
book
33 Slows down
38 Company picnic
event
40 Love story
42 Put one's sword
away
43 Forsakes
45 Napping
46 Square one
47 Fermenting
tanks
49 Pointed tool
51 Couch potato's
ailment
57 Bambi and kin
60 Opera song
62 Freshen up
63 In addition
64 Paper quantity
65
_-Saxon
66 Amer.-Eur.
alliance
67 Slalom marker
68 Even more
despicable
69 Unfortunately
70 Poetic tributes
71 In an upright
position
DOWN
1 Hindu class
2 Add on
3 Not suitable
4 Money in Sri
Lanka
5 Johnson's
comedy partner
All rights ntserved
6 Formed
7 Afros, beehives,
etc.
8 Ray of "God's
Little Acre"
9 Fliers in a skein
10 Longtime-
honored
11 Appearance
12 Welfare, U.K.-
style
13 Pismires
24 "Saturday Night
Fever" dance
26 Huron and
Superior
28 Head of Vegas?
30 After curfew
31 Muscle misery
32 Ooze
33 Toot one's own
horn
34 Judge's attire
35 Latin 101 verb
36 Aussie jumpers
37 Fund a
fellowship
39 Run after
The Behrend Beacon I 7
Will Smith
SLAVEN VLASIC/KRT
Actors Kevin James and Will Smith attend the
world premiere of "Hitch" held at Ellis Island in
New York City on Thursday, February 3, 2005.
him better. Same goes for Smith, who helped him
figure out the whole movie thing.
With "Hitch" heading into theaters Friday,
"King of Queens" about to wrap shooting for the
season and a couple of movies already completed
(including a comedy that pairs him with mentor
Ray Romano), James is looking at what's next.
He's not sure what it'll he, hut it's a good bet it will
find him playing a character unlike the ones in
"Queens" and "Hitch," both of whom are lovable,
self-deprecating klutzes.
"Rob Burnett, the producer of 'Letterman,' told
me you watch a movie for two reasons. Either it's
like a James Bond movie, where you see him do
things you'll never do, or it's a character who's a
lot like you, so you relate to him," says James.
"That's more what I've been doing, but, believe
me, my agents and everybody are going, 'We need
to go in a different direction. Let's do something
where Kevin is not the fat guy, tripping over his
suitcase.—
Even if James stays vertical for the entire film,
don't expect him to be too suave.
"The way I look at it is when you expose your
self to America and beyond, like I do on 'King of
Queens,' where the humiliating stuff is often part
of what's funny or endearing about the character, I
have no problem with that," say 3 James. "It's good
to show you have faults and you look like an idiot
some of the time, because we all do."
Solutions
41 Part of SASE
44 Fill to the brim
48 English river
50 "Key
52 Met cheer
53 Top Bolshevik
54 Point of view
55 Actress Hayes
56 Saber or rapier
57 Comic Carvey
58 Airline to Israel
59 Como
Usted?
61 Enjoy a book