November 2007

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jethro's picture

Firefox is better than IE for Australian Tax Office Portal

I have been using the Australian Tax Office Portal for years now to submit my monthly and quarterly GST returns. Until recently it never worked in Firefox, and I often had all sorts of problems with IE. However the support desk was always able to get it working (except once where they gave up and got me to request new digital certificates). However this time the problem was related to IE 7 and Java 6 on a Vista machine. Too much - poor old IE cant't do it - in their words "it gets confused about where the local certificate store is". Fortunately Firefox is not only a supported browser now but preferred!

My tax will be submitted in Firefox from now on. 

jethro's picture

Synching Face Book pictures into Outlook

If you’d like to be able to sync your contacts from Facebook with those in
Microsoft Outlook, have a look at OutSync. It’s a free Windows
application that you can use to sync the contacts of your Facebook friends with
those in Microsoft Outlook. Using OutSync you can take the photos of friends in
Facebook and add them to the matching entries in Microsoft Outlook Contacts
List, updating only the ones you select. Once the photos are in Outlook you are
then able to sync your Windows Mobile phone so that you can have the photos of
friends appear during your phone calls as well. Now OutSync is compatible with
Windows XP, Vista and Server 2003 and requires Outlook 2003 or 2007.

Thanks to Amit for these links that led me to this

 

Lena's picture

Everyday Security

Meryl Evans has written a rather long story on everyday security. She
discusses barriers in the way of organisations getting their security
right and some solutions to these problems. I think the most important
thing from this article are the ten cost-effective security measures
Meryl talks about. These are:

  • Firewalls with an Intrusion Prevention System
  • Secure email filtering gateways
jethro's picture

The High Calling Website

Gordon from RLP has been working hard on the High Calling Website, a website dedicated to recognising Christians in workplaces upholding Christian values in their work.

I have had my site linked on the Technology pages.

I particularly like the way they have described what I do!

People who work in technology often get lost in the background. They are the
ones who make the computers do what we want them to do. The people they serve
rarely contact them unless something is broken. Sometimes they feel like a cog
in the machinery. Still, these Christians are called to maintain faith and hope
in an industry that can seem very impersonal.

 

jethro's picture

What do I do?

I am always being asked what do I do?

It's complicated.

You can read about some of it on our company website where I explain our Drupal Development and hosting

jethro's picture

SyncToy - syncing files

I am using the
SyncToy 2.0 Beta
from Microsoft at the moment to assist in my development work.

I am running Vista and Office 2007 but most of my clients are still running Windows XP and Office 2003. So when I develop Excel applications I need to be able to build and test them in the same environment.

In order to make that happen on my Vista PC I am running a virtual PC that has Windows XP Pro and Office 2003 installed on it.

The Virtual PC 2007 software is free to download and install from Microsoft.

jethro's picture

How much time do you spend playing games?

As a follow up to Gamers Regret I have put up a poll on KROSTech asking how much time per week do you spend time playing games. Go and select the option for how much time you spend also.

Lena's picture

The Windows Help Program

The Windows Help (WinHlp32.exe) program that has been included in Microsoft since Microsoft Windows 3.1. WinHlp32.exe is a requirement for users who want to view 32-bit Help files that have the .hlp file name extension. Unfortunately because the Help Program hasn't had a major update for awhile it no longer meets standards, because of this Microsoft has decided to no longer include this Help program as a part of Windows. For those more advanced readers who want to, download WinHlp32 here.

Lena's picture

Tinkering with new Windows Live services

Have a go at the new Windows Live services. They're still tinkering around with them and want people to try them and comment before they're released. The new services are OneCare a security and performance service for PCS, a Gallery and an Academic Search. Windows Live Betas - Have a go!

jethro's picture

Manipulating and Massaging Data in Excel and VBA

Chad Rothschiller, a program manager on the Excel team has written a lengthy article discussing using formulas to 'clean up' data in Excel. It is very indepth and covers these topics