Online Chat Support

Getting tech support for various computer problems has become very frustrating for many.  Not only do you usually end up on hold for long periods of time, but then you end up talking to somebody in India whose accent is so thick you have hard time understanding them.  So now you not only have a computer problem, but a language barrier problem with the person trying to help you.  Frustrating indeed!

For these reasons, I will always contact tech support via their online chat system before using the phone.   Another advantage of the chat support system is that tech support can connect remotely to your computer if needed so they can see the problem first hand and even make changes for you.

Not every corporation has online chat support, but many do.  Despite this, finding their chat links can be challenging so I thought I would list them  here.  Just click the links below to go to the appropriate chat support page.

Dell Chat Support

Dell Technical Support (other contact options)

HP Chat Support 

Lexmark Support (no online chat)

McAfee Support (live chat button on top right corner of page)

Norton (Symantec) Online Chat Support

Qwest Online Chat Support

Note that I only listed the most commonly needed chat support systems here. There are more.  So if you don't see your link above, search Google.  Also, keep in mind that if you're needing help with free software (like AVG, Avast, etc., that most of these sites don't offer online chat tech support.  Instead, you can find help in their community forums). 

Open Office - The Alternative to Microsoft Office

Since typewriters are virtually obsolete, we all need a word processing program today.  Every computer running Windows has a program called Wordpad installed, which is the most basic word processing program you can get. The problem with Wordpad though is that it's so basic, that it lacks a lot of needed features.

Microsoft Works is another program that comes pre-installed on most new computers today.  Works is similar to Microsoft Office in that its a suite of office software. However, because it's typically free, it's not as good as the full featured Microsoft Office suite (which is still "king" in office suite software).  Microsoft Works Word is a better program than Wordpad, but still not as good as Microsoft Word.

If you can afford Microsoft Office, it's still the preferred choice for office software.  However, if money is tight, there is an alternative.  It's called, Open Office. 

Open Office is FREE and is a complete suite of office software.  It's very comparable to Microsoft Office.  And better yet, you can open Word and Excel documents in Open Office and edit them.  This is a HUGE plus! 

Because Open Office was designed to look and feel like Microsoft Office, it's pretty intuitive to use.  The only trick is getting used to the names of individual programs.  For example, the word processing program in Open Office is called, Writer (instead of Word).  The spreadsheet program is called, "Calc" (instead of Excel).   Open Office even has a PowerPoint counterpart called, Impress. Here's the complete suite of programs that comes with Open Office:

• Writer (similar to Microsoft Word)
• Calc (similar to Microsoft Excel)
• Impress (similar to PowerPoint)
• Base (similar to Access)
• Draw (a graphics program which is better than Paint).

If you don't have Microsoft Office installed on your computer, I would recommend downloading and installing Open Office. 

Configuring WordBB to work with MyBB

WordBB is a Wordpress plugin designed to bridge MyBB and Wordpress together.  The purpose of doing this is so they work together. It's a way to integrate your existing MyBB forum into your Wordpress site. 

If you already have a Wordpress site, installing the plugin is easy.  Just log into your WP site and click the plugins link and then "add new' and search for "wordbb".  Once you find it, you can install and activate it.

Then comes the tricky part.

Once WordBB has been installed and activated, you'll have to click the links that reads, "WordBB Options" to configure it. And in order to configure it, you'll need to have some information handy (namely, the details of your database setup - that is, the database you setup during your MyBB installation).

Hopefully, you kept some notes during the installation process to make it easier to retrieve this information.  If you didn't, you'll have to log into your web host account and look up the details of your database.  Here's what you need to know:

• The name of your MySQL database that was set up during MyBB installation. 
• The username for that database
• The password for the database
• The Host Server for the database

You should keep these details in a file so you can refer back to them again if needed.  Another thing you need to know is the URL of your MyBB forum. This is pretty straight forward.  The URL would look something like:  http://www.yourdomain.com/forum/

There is one other thing you'll need to complete the WordBB configuration and this is where most people get hung up.You'll need to know is the "MyBB Absolute path on the server". 

The easiest way to get this piece of information is to create a PHP file and paste some code into it and upload it to your server in the MyBB root folder (i.e., the folder you installed MyBB to).  This PHP file (when executed) will tell you what the absolute path is.  So here's what you do.

Open you're favorite web editing software (I use Dreamweaver) and create a new PHP file.  Name the file "rootchecker.php" and save it to the same folder you installed MyBB to.  I installed MyBB to a folder named, "forum" on my root directory, so that is where I saved the rootchecker.php file to.

Now copy the code below and then paste it into the rootchecker.php file just after the tag. Then save the file and upload it.

echo $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'];
?>

Once the rootchecker.php file has been uploaded, open your internet browser and type in the URL (being sure to replace "yourdomain.com" with your actual domain name). :

http://www.yourdomain.com/forum/rootchecker.php

You'll see a string of text when you're done.  That text is the path to your root folder. Copy that entire string of text and paste it on the "MyBB absolute path on server" field on the WordBB Options page and save the changes. 

If you see an error message saying, "can't find global.php file' after saving the changes, you'll have to follow the steps below. 

First re-open your "rootchecker.php" file and find the code previously pasted into it and remove it.  In it's place, copy and paste the code below:

Save the file and reupload it. Then open your internet browser again and go back to the URL mentioned above (http://www.yourdomain.com/forum/rootchecker.php).  Once again you'll see a string of text.  Copy and paste this text into the "MyBB absolute path on server" and save.  Hopefully you won't see any more error messages.  

Firefox Plans to Develop a New Privacy Tool

Most know their movements are tracked while they surf the web (primarily for advertising reasons) and some of us even use additional software tools to help reduce of that tracking.   One of tools I use is Firefox (instead of Internet Explorer). With Firefox, I have a little more contrrol over my privacy and advertising.

For those who don't know what Firefox is, it's an internet browser (like Internet Explorer). I've been using it for years, but only started recommending it to my clients in past couple of years.  Before Internet Explorer 7 was released, Firefox confused a lot of people.  But now that Microsoft has copied Firefox (with the release of IE7), more and more people are comfortable using it.

The new "Do Not Track" feature (when enabled) will basically tell web sites that you've opted-out of online advertising behavior.  In response, they're not supposed to track your movements through their site for advertising purposes.

No doubt, some sites will try to counteract  this feature by posting messages that some features of their site may not function properly with the "do not track" feature enabled.  My response .... ignore the messages. As long as you're seeing and doing what want a web site, there's no reason to disable the feature.


For more information about the "Do Not Track" privacy tool in Firefox, click here.

Facebook Plans to Invade Your Privacy Again

Many Facebook users are already concerned about their privacy issues, but once again, Facebook doesn't seem to care.

As if they weren't already making enough money, they now plan to use you in their ads.  So every time you "like" a certain a product or "check in" to one of your favorite local coffee shops, etc., you risk having your profile connected with that merchant and published in one of FB's ads.  In Facebook's own words ....

"Facebook said the sponsored stories are all labeled as such. Users won't get any special notification that their posts have been sponsored and used as ads, and there's no option for users to opt out of the service".

The fact that FB users won't even be able to "opt-out" of this feature is really upsetting.  It will be interesting to see if Facebook does and about face on this one as users voice their complaints.

For more information about Facebook's plans to use you in their Ads, click here.

Comparing Computer Processors

Most people know that when buying a new computer, it's important to look at the CPU speed and the amount of RAM (Memory) is installed.  But start talking about different type of processors, and confusion quickly sets in.

Intel and AMD are the two biggest manufacturers of Computer Processors (CPU's) and for the average consumer, it really doesn't matter much today which one you get.  This isn't true for online gamers where speed is very important. But for the rest of us, who don't want to spend top dollar for the latest and greatest processor and don't need nano-second speed advantages ... the average CPU is usually sufficient.

For those who do care, there is a great site with side by side comparisons of CPU benchmark tests that you may find useful. 

Forcing WWW to Show in URL in Wordpress

Wordpress is a great place to host a blog, but it does have its frustrations.  I won't go into them all here, but one thing that I and others have found very frustrating is forcing the web address to show 'www' before the domain name. 

Why is this important?  There are several reasons.  First, search engines don't like it when a website's address will sometimes show as www.example.com and other times it shows as example.com.  Search engines will sometimes view this as two different websites with duplicate content.  The easiest way to fix this is to force the URL to always show the www before the domain name.

Some Wordpress Plugins (like S2Member) also require the 'www' in the URL in order to function properly.  The trick, however, is getting the job done.

If you search the web, you'll find a plethora of information about how to force the www in the URL.  Some sites suggest editing the HTACCESS file.  This may or may not work depending on your setup, but it didn't work for me.

I also tried calling tech support for my host (GoDaddy.com) for help in reconfiguring the CNAME in the Domain Manager.  This didn't work either.  The good folks at GoDaddy informed me that things were set correctly to force the www on the server, but that Wordpress was overwriting their configuration. 

After hours of frustration of trying every suggestion on the web, I finally found the answer in the Wordpress settings (and you wouldn't believe how simple it was to fix)!  Here's how I fixed the problem.

1. Log into Wordpress
2. On the left side of the screen, scroll down to SETTINGS and click GENERAL
3. Change the Wordpress Address URL) to www.example.com (replacing example.com to your domain)
4. Change the SITE URL to www.example.com (replacing example.com  with your domain)
5. Scroll down and click the blue SAVE CHANGES button

 That's it.  No need to edit the HTACCESS file, PHP files, or any other files (in this case anyway).