Top Ten Blogs May 2007

As always I end the month with a list of the most popular posts. This is mainly to aid people who get here by searching for topics included in this months archive web page.

So, here’s the top ten for May in no particular order…

1. Auto Update Programs Running All the Time


2. PC World: June Tool of the Month


3. Harry McCracken Is Having a Good Day


4. Is Your Hard Drive Air Conditioned?


5. Google Reports on Web-based Dangers


6. Windows Update Sponsored By...


7. WinPatrol: 100 Best Products of 2007


8. Signature Update Kills Computers in China


9. Google is still #1, Ask.com Fails Test


10. Desktop to Tabletop with Microsoft Surface™

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Desktop to Tabletop with Microsoft Surface™

This morning on the Today Show, Bill Gates unveiled one of the coolest things I’ve seen come out of Microsoft is years. It’s a 42” x 21” inch table about 22 inches high with a 30 inch multi-point touch screen. It provides a computing experience that until now was only available in Sci-Fi movies. It’s called Microsoft Surface™ and you can see what it can do at http://www.microsoft.com/surface/.



While I love the demo applications I still haven’t seen what will be the killer application that will bring Surface to the main stream consumer. Without a practical killer app the Surface table top could just be a novelty and looks like a high definition version of Microsoft Bob. I’m sure it will have plenty of uses in Vegas but moving it into home will take some imagination.

Luckily, there are plenty of folks out there with imagination. My brain can’t stop thinking of potential killer apps. As soon as an SDK is available I’ll be getting my hands on it. Now that the device is public I’m sure I won’t be the only one.

Will I pay the estimated $5000–$10,000 initial price tag to have this cool toy in my home/office? Hard to say at this time but I know I want one. I may have to wait until they have one that tilts up like an easel or it will quickly kill my back. The ergonomics of the tabletop computer is a real drawback.

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Google is still #1, Ask.com Fails Test

There has been a lot of talk these days about new search company's taking on Google and trying to take some of their traffic away. Ask.com created an aggressive multi-million dollar ad campaign claiming they have a better algorithm for searches. In the SF Bay area, the highways have been littered with billboards that say “The Algorithm Killed Jeeves.” TV commercials paint Google as an evil information monopoly with Ask.com being an underground savior.

According to a new study this month by Hitwise, Google is still king of the search with 64.13% of the traffic. Yahoo followed with 21.26% and MSN with 9.15%. Ask.com came in 4th with 3.48% While is data shows where people are searching it doesn't say who is best.

To find out who is best, I use the "Pytlovany Test". Having a unique last name I've found it to be a good keyword to find out who has the best search bots and methodology. A search on "Pytlovany" on most search engines will usually find a number of references to me and my family and not much else.

Google not only returns the most results, but the topics that show up first are relevant and timely. Currently, the first result is this Blog which makes sense since it's updated regularly. It probably doesn't hurt that my Blog is hosted by Google. I haven't looked at all the results but they claim to find over 9000 references. This number includes non-English web pages.

Yahoo returns about 1200 hits and seems to like my LinkedIn profile. Bits from Bill is listed 4th and other results are all very relevant to anyone searching on Pytlovany.

MSN or Live Search returns over 1800 hits with this Blog at the top and nicely spreads out the results with other family members and their pages.

Ask.com returned less than a thousand sites but the results were the most annoying. On the top of their list is a link to the "Pytlovany Surname Resource Center". This is a genealogy page created to attract search traffic by listing every name they can find. It has no meaning to anyone searching and should not be included.

These days a lot of content is stolen and copied to adware sites so even the Pytlovany name isn’t safe . I decided to look more carefully at the first 5 pages of results to see how accurate the search was. I was pretty happy with what I found. Most sites listed references to myself and family members.

The only failure was to Ask.com. In the first 50 sites returned, 8 were bogus genealogy sites, surname databases, and others looking to get my attention instead of providing results. I admit, I wasn’t a fan of Ask.com and their Toolbar/Zwinky stuff but my test doesn’t lie. It will be interesting to see if spending millions of dollars promoting their poor technology will calculate into more users.

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Memorial Day Thoughts

My thoughts today go out to 10th Mountain Division, based out of Fort Drum NY and their families. While many of us enjoy the privilege of picnics with family and friends our soldiers continue to search for their brothers missing since they were kidnapped on May 12th.

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Sunbelt Competitive Update for $9.95

I often am asked for advice on what AntiSpyware programs to use in addition to WinPatrol’s protection. It’s not a question I can always answer because it really depends on who’s using the computer and what their online habits are.  Anyone with a brain will tell you never depend on just one security program.

My daughter Amy uses CounterSpy from Sunbelt Software and has been pretty happy. I’ve had a chance to meet some of the folks at Sunbelt and consider them good people.

Software sales are always a little slow in the summer so Sunbelt has come up with a way to keep their sales people busy.  They’re offering their Counter Spy version 2 software for as low as $9.95. It’s a competitive upgrade offer but it appears they’ll take your word on what competitor you’ve been using. 

For $9.95,  I think it’s worth checking it out. You have until June 30th.   More Info

Click her to read what PC Magazines guru Neil Rubenking thinks

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Signature Update Kills Computers in China

Anyone who has read my columns knows I’m not a big fan of auto-updates. I’ve even recommended most users wait a week to implement some of the Tuesday security updates for Windows to see what other problems they cause. As a software developer I know how important it is to test the littlest change and that many errors just won’t be found no matter how much it’s tested in the lab.

Last week what should have been a simple data update in Symantecs signature database disabled thousands of their customers in China. Based on information in the new signature Norton AntiVirus software automatically quarantined two Microsoft files necessary for Windows to run. Users who tried to reboot after running one of Nortons scanners were greeted with a fatal system error.

The system files, netapi32.dll and isasrv.dll were a part of the Chinese Windows XP Service Pack 2. Unfortunately, Symantec flagged these files as a Trojan they called Bockdoor.Haxdoor. Ironically, this comes just after Symantec released a study about the growth of criminal hacking in China.

At first I thought this was a case of faulty testing by Symantec. In investigating the entire story I found out how really scary it was. Symantec blamed the error on a flaw in their “Automated threat analysis system”. That sounds like new signatures are being created and distributed with no lab testing at all.

In related news, if your XM radio wasn’t working recently, you can blame software updates for that one too. If you’re a XM Radio subscriber you can call 800.967.2346 and they’ll give you a two day credit. It may only come out to 87 cents but it’s worth letting them know its unacceptable.

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Google Online Security

I was pleased to read in Donna’s SecurityFlash that Google has a new blog dedicated to Online Security. I expect we’ll be seeing regular posts so I have added Google Online Security to the list of “Blogs I Read”.

“Online security is an important topic for Google, our users, and anyone who uses the Internet. The related issues are complex and dynamic and we've been looking for a way to foster discussion on the topic and keep users informed. Thus, we've started this blog where we hope to periodically provide updates on recent trends, interesting findings, and efforts related to online security. Among the issues we'll tackle is malware, which is the subject of our inaugural post.”

Click to Read the Introductory Post.

I’m glad that Google is using their own Blogger software for this new initiative. Perhaps it will mean less down time for BlogSpot users.

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