Online PC health check

Is your computer protected?

F-Secure Health Check is a free online tool that lets you know if your computer is protected and helps you fix possible security issues.

In just a few minutes, and without installing anything on your computer, you can find out:
Whether your firewall, anti-virus, and anti-spyware software is turned on and up to date
Whether your photographs, text documents, and other irreplaceable content are automatically backed up
Whether there are security updates available for the most widely used programs on your computer such as the operating system, web browsers and media players.

In addition, Health Check’s summary page provides a report of your computer’s overall health, as well as recommendations for improving its protection.

If the check shows any issues you are not sure about just contact us for advice.

Start PC health check

Embed an excel spread sheet in a web page.

I have a web site client who wants to use a simple calculator within a web page to allow his customers to calculate  a cost for total postage due. The client already had a spreadsheet with the calculation so the easy way was to embed that spreadsheet within his existing website.  In the past this would have been difficult to achieve but now , thanks to skydrive it is just a few mouse clicks.
Step 1:Go to SkyDrive and create a new account if you don’t already have one, and then create a public folder.

Step 2:Upload your spreadsheet to your public folder, and then open it in the Web App.
At the top of the page, click Share, and then choose Embed. In the dialog box, specify the data that you want to embed and customize how you want it to appear on your web page.

Step 3: At the bottom of the dialog box, click Copy to grab the embed code (or markup) and copy it to your Clipboard.
Step 4: The markup you copied from the Excel Web App page is an iframe tag, supported in many web authoring environments and blog services. Go to your blog editor, begin writing your post, then switch to HTML editing.

Step 5: Make sure the markup you copied is the most recent item in your Clipboard and press CTRL + V. There’s your embedded spreadsheet!

Your web visitors can now ineract with your spread sheet which will return to it’s original state once they sign out.

 

Rouge DNS servers

The FBI has uncovered a plot to infect computers and the ADSL routers that they use to get to the internet with a type of malware called a rouge DNS settings.

The effect of the infection is to redirect your web browsing to unsafe sites. For example you may type in www.bbc.co.uk to your web browser but be redirected to another rouge site.

To check if your PC or router has been infected open a command promt and type

ipconfig /all

Look for the line DNS servers. if it contains any of the numbers belowor you need more advice on browser rediret or DNS settings contact us.

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Free broadband for Wales and Anglesey…

… that at least is the headline at the top of the web site of a company who specialise in providing satellite broadband to Welsh homes. However the headline is actually about a grant from the Welsh office towards the hardware required for you to obtain satellite broadband. You still have to pay the monthly fees. In this respect it is just another option,  for Anglesey residents who live in a phone line broadband not spot.

Details of the satellite scheme can be found here.

Web links do not work in emails or in Word

It is very useful to be able to just click on a web address in an email or in word and have the link open up in your browser. However if you install and then remove or even upgraded a web browser such as Chrome or Firefox the links can some time become broken.  You then have to copy and past the link into your browser which , depending on the length of the address can be a pain.

But did you know there is a “fix it” for that!

Just go to this address and run the small program which Microsoft has provided to allow you to fix the issue. Run the fix and then reboot and your hyperlinks should be working again.

Broadband support scheme on Anglesey extended

The Welsh government Business Minister Edwina Hart has announced she is extending the highly successful Broadband Support Scheme which is tackling and eradicating broadband notspots in Wales.

The Scheme provides a grant of up to £1,000 to residents, businesses and third sector organisations in broadband notspots to enable them to obtain a broadband connection using the most appropriate technology available.

The £2m project launched in 2010 was due to end this financial year but Mrs Hart is now extending the project to ensure the Welsh Government can respond to individuals with immediate broadband issues.

It will operate in parallel to the Next Generation Broadband for Wales (NGBW) project which will bring high speed broadband to homes and businesses that the market will not reach unaided.

The NGBW project is on track to identify a winning bidder in March 2012, with the roll out of infrastructure beginning later that year, and concluding in 2015.

Mrs Hart said the Broadband Support scheme has been very successful and to date more than 2000 applications have been approved with a further 230 being assessed.

“It is filling a real need and making a difference to individuals, businesses and communities enabling them to participate in the benefits of the digital age.

“Terminating the Broadband Support Scheme in March 2012 could leave a potential gap in our ability to support people with immediate broadband issues. I am therefore pleased to announce we are extending the scheme to provide continuity during the early roll-out of next generation broadband and will continue to review the relevance of the Broadband Support Scheme during this period.”

To date 2,038 applications have been approved, which includes funding for sixteen community schemes covering 918 homes, representing a financial commitment of £1,662,709.

A further 232 applications are currently being assessed with interest from another ten community schemes (covering 1,055 potential applicants).

The Scheme will allow individuals, businesses and communities in Wales’ remaining broadband slowspots to approach service providers directly, with support of Welsh Government funding.

Who can apply for support?

• Individuals
• Communities
• SMEs
• 3rd sector organisations
• broadband connectivity which is less than 2Mbps.

You will not be able to apply for this Scheme if you have received funding from a previous publicly funded broadband scheme or you do not meet the scheme eligibility criteria.

How much support can I apply for?

Support will be available for up to a maximum of £1,000 for individual premises.

More details

22% of users on Anglesey have slow broadband

The latest ofcom figures show that the average broadband speed on Anglesey is 5.4 Mbps and that 22% of users have a speed of less than 2 Mbps.

See details