CONTENTS *** NewsBytes *** Social whirl Data protection bites back How long should emails be kept? Physical memory limits for Windows operating systems The sensational new EyePad Q&A: Why are our office PCs slowing down? Clicks of the Trade - Save a web page quickly and efficiently

Overview of InfoBulletin Viewing IB (online versions only) View IB Digital Book editions Subscriptions Implementation Privacy policy Contact Details Archives & index of issues coopsys.net Services Approach InfoBulletin About us Contact Us

Popular editions May 2008 Outlook Time Recording: Journal, Video to ruin your ISP? Zoho: software at your service, OCR tips, BGInfo, How to audit my PC? August 2008 Risky business, Salesforce review, SteadyState manages multi-user PCs, Do you really need a web site? June 2008 Time Recording: Outlook Times plug-in, Windows Server 2008 storage, data protection, Convert PDF documents into Word format

Twitter Updates Follow IB on Twitter! Become an IB Facebook fan!

*** NewsBytes ***
London puts public data online February saw the launch of an online repository of public datasets made available for organisations and individuals to put to "inspirational uses", says the London Datastore. The data on offer covers everything from Abandoned Vehicles through to Years Lost due to Suicide, plus the whole gamut of human experience espoused in numbers along the way, including Births and Fertility Rates, Carbon Dioxide Emissions, Census Statistics, Homelessness, Housing Sales, Influenza Rates, Life Expectancy, Properties in Floodplains, and Stone Throwing Incidents Recorded by British Transport Police. By giving away datasets to stimulate analysis projects, the Greater London Authority (GLA) to aid transparency and engage citizens. The datasets at the London Datastore come in CSV, web page and PDF formats and the site contains categories and a full search, as well as links for requesting new datasets. Practical steps to achieve safe IT systems Taking reasonable steps to manage IT risk down to an 'appropriate level' is a tricky but legal requirement. Find out how to crack the tough and boring steps of sidelining hackers, staff with a grudge, and buggy software. Bookmark your appointment at 2pm with Philip Anthony at the NCVO Risk Management Conference 2010. The all-day event includes speakers on legal and trustee issues, campaigning and reputation management, plus the human resources angle. Where: NCVO Conference Suite When: 9th March 2010 Book online or call 0207 520 2597 Apple takes a bite out of charity donations An anti-bullying charity has taken issue with Apple's refusal to allow donation buttons to be allowed into its iPhone apps. Submitting his version II app of the BullyingUK to app creation site AppMakr, CEO John Carnell received the reply "Apple tends to reject Apps that have content related to donations or charity." He has started an #appledonatefail Twitter campaign intended to get the phone giant to come clean on whether they aim to get a cut on all iPhone apps passing through their app store, irrespective of commercial or charity status. eBook VAT spat Unlike the UK's zero VAT-rated paper books, e-books don't attract the same exemption, as some post Christmas e-Reader owners will have realised in the current return to the 17.5% VAT climate. Arguably a tax on a greener way of reading, the governmental discretion over whether to charge eBook tax or not (Spain 4%, Norway 25%) will only continue until 2011 until the EU can decide on levelling the VAT playing field for all books irrespective of medium. In the meantime there is inevitably an ongoing petition.	Google's Wave causes a Buzz But among some Gmail users it's more like the buzz of angry bees. Having latched its experimental Wave application into Gmail, Google has created social-networking for its mail users, called Buzz. Updates from web services such as Twitter, Flickr and Picasa can be pulled into the Buzz stream and users can publish postings and follow or be followed, Twitter-like. But the initial requirement for Gmail users to enable a public profile on their accounts has started a minor backlash in Google's own help forum, citing issues of Facebook-style loss of privacy, contacts being 'outed', parental control and default settings. The Buzz real time update service is intended to remove clutter from the inboxes of users' who have hundreds or thousands of friends, but even though private settings can be implemented, the Buzz roll out clearly has some privacy concerns to address. Update: In response to the outcry, Google has tweaked Buzz to make it easier to block unwanted followers and an ability to untick the default public profile. Windows 7 spawns phone series Hot on the heels of this year's releases from Google (Nexus One on Android) and Apple (iPad), Microsoft has started from scratch with its minimalist Windows Phone 7 Series, replacing its lacklustre Windows Mobile platform. MP3 and video fans will notice more than a passing resemblance to the Zune HD media player, being aimed squarely at the consumer market. However, the stripped-down retro interface abandons fancy 3D-like renderings and offers customisable 'desktop' icons for things like applications or favourite contacts, and synchronises with social networking sites Microsoft-hosted cloud services such as photo albums. Dell laptops: tougher and better value Dell has launched two new laptops: the education focused Latitude 2100 and the rugged Latitude XFR for outdoor use. Complementing other business-range products such as the diminutive desktop, Optiplex Fx160, Dell have also cut the price of their Latitude range. Contact us to find out more. Future fibre gets fast-forwarded Faster broadband via fibre optic cable could soon make its way into more homes and offices, as part of a move by BT to open its underground ducts to competing communications companies. Fibre allows faster and more simultaneous broadband connections than the remaining old copper wire, but laying the cables is expensive for BT's rivals, who currently have to dig up pavements or route fibre cables through sewers. The initiative could speed up the nationwide rollout of next-generation broadband.
*** end of NewsBytes ***

	^ Back to contents ^
	1. Social whirl Social media round up.
Help at hand. Back issues just a click away	One's a crowd One of the benefits of the social media phenomenon has been about moving people, emotionally, but also quite literally. The role played by mobiles has been key because this very personal form of messaging helps get campaigns mobilised due to the immediacy of communication. Just one person (albeit a popular person) can shift hundreds or thousands of people - or pounds - behind a movement, maybe even in a matter of minutes. For those more acquainted with distribution lists for email, Twitter and Facebook could be seen as the on-steroids equivalents for phone text. With people spending an increasing amount of time on their smartphones and away from the desktop, going 'social' has been a means to straddle the demands of work and private life. Twitter In the time since Twitter spat out its first tweet, a vast number of varying interfaces have built up around it, each adding value to the basic 140-character theme of mass texting. Check out Hootsuite for multi-editor accounts, and Twhirl, Tweetdeck for monitoring a mass of Twitter accounts at the same time. Facebook The recipient of a much improved interface in February, perhaps celebrating its sixth birthday, Facebook clarified its layout options and rights admin pages for the better. The largest social media site around now serves 100 million mobile users alone. An impressive reach, or a big crowd to get lost in, depending on your point of view. Ning Starting with a logical interface at the outset, Ning bundles together a blog, wiki, forum, photo/video gallery, status feed, events calendar and member manager. Many more so-called widgets can be added at will. The site boasts about 300,000 active groups and 40 million users. Amassing a mass Choosing a social media site isn't just about the application front end though; each site comes with its own crowd. Which inevitably begs the question, where is your natural audience? Surveying this market is less like choosing a shop to set out your stall, and more like discovering a high street with the most suitable passing trade. Thus, if you're campaigning for the rights of elder citizens, then you probably will find less interest among Bebo fans than would a dynamic environmental protest organisation. Write once, publish everywhere - stick that in your pipe The flourishing social media sites (places where we actually view and contribute stuff) have seen a rash of complementary facilitating sites growing up around them (sites that simply pipe information elsewhere). Mario Menti's very popular Twitterfeed has experienced a rise to fame, handling close on a million feeds (at present) by simply passing headlines via RSS from your blog to sites like Twitter, Facebook and more. Others like Laconica (StatusNet) and Hellotxt also act as status feeds and micro-blogging facilitators. In plainer English, this means sending info about where you are, what you are doing, or text-length blogs to your social networks. Another information routing site that takes the same concept and goes bananas with it is Ping.fm, allowing you to stream content to literally dozens of social media sites in one go, but also adds feeds from email, SMS, Instant Message and phone apps into the mix. These information pipes work by authenticating with the destination site (eg asking to store your Twitter/Facebook login credentials), so they can turn blogs into tweets without further prompting. A security hazard? Well, since your content is going to be public anyway, data protection isn't as much an issue, but you should check to ensure you trust the facilitating site with your social media credentials - it is after all the gateway to a public voice in your name. Feeding your news habit - the role of RSS This popular news protocol (expanded variously as Really Simple Syndication or RDF Site Summary) could be described as 'Feed anything to anything to anywhere'. The general standardisation of RSS and Atom protocols as a means of feeding your scribblings into other news aggregators is a powerful publishing tool, as well as a mega time-saver. By writing just one blog or updating a single news column, you can stream your prose simultaneously into all the social networks where you are a member, thus reducing the burden of maintaining multiple social media accounts, yet keeping your fans happy with fresh content. It doesn't have to be just a blog though, since any Web Content Management System worth its salt these days will output an RSS feed without you lifting a finger. Just about any web application now features an RSS link, be it a blog, a news module, a forum or an instant messaging stream. Fit to print? Mightier than the pen perhaps, but beware - RSS can be a double-edged sword. For example, piping a forum's RSS feed straight into Twitter can be dangerous. Again, it's all in the public domain but a) forum contributors may not be aware their rants are being listened in on by the Twittersphere at large, and b) you can still pull inappropriate or abusive posts even from an unmoderated forum, but once they're in Twitter, it's history - as in 'permanently on display'. Another side effect is that your Twitter followers or Facebook fans might run a mile on being suddenly blasted with the collective spleen-venting of hundreds of forum members, though sensation and controversy can attract and repulse in equal measure.. Engaging your audience Of course, unless you are a riveting and already popular columnist, nothing will attract fans like real conversation. Unfortunately, geeks lured in by the technology of social media networks often find their introverted personalities are actually the least suited to engaging more followers. For all the efficiencies engendered by piping feeds around the place as described above, you can't beat a few rousing words and a little simpatico scattered at the right time. Step forward, media and PR whizzkids. Walking the talk Enterprises and organisations have embraced the social media with varying degrees of scepticism and enthusiasm. Rightly so, as the culture blurs boundaries of personal life and work time, mixing up the ethics, and at worst creating whistle-blowing outlets. Inevitably, the larger enterprises have sought to cover themselves with a new brand of social media policies. Social exclusion All of the above sites are free to use and therefore give no guarantees of reliability. As such you use them at your own risk. Twitter has been notorious for crashing under load and spam attacks, as it strains to find new storage and bandwidth architectures (or indeed a viable business model) to accommodate demand, none of which seems to deter its ever rising user base from coming back. Facebook has suffered slings and arrows of a different kind with past criticisms over its changing policies on protection of users' profile data. Twitterfeed too has not been without its problems, with changes in authentication procedure and moves to new hardware. To paraphrase the caveats so beloved of the beleaguered financial sector: sites will come up as well as go down. -IB- Still confused by social media? Use the form below to ask us for a helping hand to get you started. Tell me moreHelp me set it upSend me a quoteRemind me later Email* Org Learn more about RSS.

	^ Back to contents ^
	2. Data protection bites back Serious data breaches are being punished with serious sanctions come April 2010. Are your data protection procedures up to scratch?
Help at hand. Back issues just a click away	"When things go wrong, a security breach can cause real harm and great distress to thousands of people." Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham Anyone working in the UK's not-for-profit sector must by now be aware of the Data Protection Act, but for many people it's still only vaguely familiar or a nod towards getting the registration done and ticking another bureaucratic box. From 6 April 2010 however, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is getting tough with serious lapses of data security and is able to impose fines of up to £500,000 on the organisations responsible. That's a big risk to take for the sake of a few basic practices and some training. The principles aren't hard for staff and volunteers to grasp; it's largely about fairness to those whose data is being held, a common facet of membership and contacts databases. using information in a way that people would reasonably expect and in a way that is fair; ensuring people know how their information will be used, for example by providing a privacy notice or publishing it on your website. Organisations can make life easier for themselves by not keeping every email and document that comes their way. The less you store, the less information is potentially at risk. One can think of the change in emphasis as looking at the data you keep in terms of "Would it matter if we didn't have this information at all?" Constructing a set of policies is one thing, but enacting them is another. Storage repositories of emails and documents that require, say, a minimum retention of 12 months and a maximum or 24months could add up to a lot of maintenance. Plug leaky data holes There have been high profile examples of personal records being lost or misplaced through inappropriate communication, transported on easily readable CDs or stolen as part of a laptop's contents. All of which will drive future requirements for organisations to encrypt digital information they hold about other people. Likewise, the need to turf out information that doesn't need to be kept is already making expiration polices and document management systems (DMS) the rule rather than the exception. However automating a lot of these requirements can make such maintenance almost redundant. Windows 7 now builds in BitLocker encryption, so that a laptop's whole hard drive can be protected in the event of loss or theft. On local area networks, it is possible to disable writing to USB devices altogether on Windows XP SP2, Vista and Windows 7, making data theft and leaks much less likely. For organisations with a mix of machines and operating systems, multi-platform encryption can be obtained freely from TrueCrypt and even installed as a portable version to completely encrypt USB memory sticks and hard drives. Employing VPN (virtual private network) technology allows remote employees to access an organisation's private data safely. All the data served to the user at the far end is encrypted and the only data retained locally is the connection to the VPN server. Email too can be provided securely via a VPN connection instead of the usual web browser plus https method. While a full document management system (DMS) can be expensive, automating email retention and expiration can be implemented on current versions of Microsoft Exchange and gets better still in the upcoming 2010 release. Christopher Graham, Information Commissioner, said recently: "Getting data protection right has never been more important than it is today. As citizens, we are increasingly asked to complete transactions online, with the state, banks and other organisations using huge databases to store our personal details. When things go wrong, a security breach can cause real harm and great distress to thousands of people." Create a data protection policy for your organisation. This is one of the best ways of going through the check list and at least finding out the scope of measures for your needs. We've made it easy by giving you a free Data Protection Policy template to download and get started. Contacts Information Commissioner's new Guide to Data Protection (PDF) ICO penalties guidance press release (PDF) Data Protection for Voluntary Organisations (Paperback) by Paul Ticher Check out social media policies from BBC to UK Government If any of the issues discussed here affect you, do get in touch using the form below. Tell me moreHelp me set it upSend me a quoteRemind me later Email* Org -IB-

	^ Back to contents ^
	3. How long should emails be kept? Data retention and expiration policies are becoming an issue for organisations to implement.
Help at hand. Back issues just a click away	While legal firms may be required to keep their case data for 6 years, financial regulations can demand the retention of records for 10 years or more. But what about email? The de facto behaviour in the absence of any organisational governance is often to keep all emails forever 'just in case', until either they are lost through technical malfunction or deleted by accident. Doing time - some legal examples 3 years - Compensation claims, such as personal injury 6 years - Claims of simple contract or tort 12 years - Claims based on sealed documents 15 years – Claims of latent damage (injured party was unaware) In such an atmosphere of indifference, it's better to start developing a policy even if there is no apparent need for one yet. What data and records an organisation should retain or destroy is the purpose of a data retention policy, as well as when and how that should be executed. Moreover, this applies to all forms covering both electronic and paper. The guiding principle of retaining the minimum necessary should be borne in mind especially with respect to personal information, but how long is too long? As background, take a look through recent trends: The UK government now mandates ISPs to retain email data for 12 months## though this data does not include the body text of emails Microsoft announced recently that it was reducing the length of time for which it keeps search data from 18 months to 6 months Google retains search data for 9 months Yahoo! keeps theirs for 90 days Of course, search data contains things like IP addresses, query text and browser information, so does not contain nearly as much personally identifiable information (PII) as the average office worker squirrels away in an average inbox. Automating email retention and expiration In implementing a data retention/expiration policy, it's important to set upper and lower limits. The minimum time (retention) exists to comply with statutory, regulatory or legislative needs, while the maximum time (expiration) is there to satisfy the protection of consumers or subscribers. Email retention policies can be automated with various degrees of ease depending on which version of Microsoft Exchange you have installed. Users of Exchange 2003 must implement group policies for Outlook, preferably rolled out centrally rather per workstation. Move up to Exchange 2007 and Exchange 2010 and we find retention and expiration policy is implemented through Messaging Records Management (MRM). MRM uses sophisticated tagging to make it easier to keep or remove different classes of email messages, thus aiding compliance with organisational policy, government regulations, or legal needs, and to remove redundant content. However there are plenty of other features that make an Exchange upgrade worthwhile (see Exchange features table below). Will backups break data retention rules? Normally, information will 'disappear' from backup sets (tapes, NAS, etc) as part of their natural cycle since most backup systems store data for no more than a few months due to storage limitations. However, if your backup cycle strays into many months or years, it should be checked against your policies, as well as guarding against bringing back huge volumes of data during any emergency restore processes. A written policy should be drafted in consultation with employees - since they may have to carry out out and monitor its consequences - and be available for public scrutiny. Built-in Protection - Compare Exchange features Key: = Feature included = Feature not included Features Exchange Server 2000 Exchange Server 2003 Exchange Server 2007 Anti-spam and Antivirus       Virus Scanning Application Programming Interface (VSAPI) Integrated IP based block and allow lists Exchange Server Intelligent Message Filter (IMF) A Frequent content filter updates to the IMF B C Distribution lists restricted to authenticated users Support for Sender ID D Attachment stripping in Outlook Web Access Perimeter network protection using the Edge Transport Server - domain membership not required Automatic spam signature, IP reputation, and content filter (IMF) updates E Dynamic analysis of sender reputation Attachment stripping on the Edge or Hub Transport server roles EdgeSync for recipient filtering and safe sender respect Microsoft Office Outlook E-mail Postmark validation Anti-spam stamp - background on spam assessment Two-tiered spam quarantine - administrator and end user Antivirus stamp - track virus scanning history Antivirus agent access to Exchange MIME parsing engine for robust transport level scanning Edge Transport service resilience for inbound SMTP message receipt rate control - enables high availability Open proxy detection to help prevent Denial of Service (DOS) and spam attacks Confidential Messaging       Transport Layer Security (TLS) Encryption Signed Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) requests to Active Directory service Support for S/MIME enabled clients Front-end and back-end Kerberos authentication Outlook Web Access traffic encrypted by default using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Automatic intra-organization message encryption Compliance       Journaling Multi-mailbox search F F Per user or per distribution list journaling G Retention and expiration policy application through Messaging Records Management Managed Folders Hub Transport rules Business Continuity       Active/Passive clustering Database backup via Microsoft Volume Shadow Copy Service Eight-node clustering Recovery storage groups Continuous replication - built-in asynchronous replication of storage groups Backup from database copy (local) or server (cluster) Database portability - recovery to any server in the organization A) With SP1 and above B) With SP2, bi-weekly updates available C) With Standard CAL, bi-weekly updates available; with Enterprise CAL or Forefront Security for Exchange Server, daily or more frequent updates available D) With SP2 E) With Enterprise CAL or Forefront Security for Exchange Server, daily or more frequent updates available F) Uses Microsoft Exchange Mailbox Merge G) With Enterprise CAL A useful guide is The ICSA Guide to Document Retention (Paperback) by Andrew C. Hamer. Contacts Understanding Retention Tags and Retention Policies - Messaging Records Management (MRM) Email Archiving and Mailbox Size - Best Practice Recommendations Under Microsoft's Exchange Server Configure retention settings and AutoArchive in Outlook 2007 - Microsoft Technet -IB-

	^ Back to contents ^
	4. Physical memory limits for Windows operating systems Check how much memory your system can take.
Help at hand. Back issues just a click away	Windows operating systems allow for different amounts of maximum memory to be fitted. Some cope with more than others. Check yours below before going for a memory upgrade. Memory limits Windows 7 Memory limits Windows Vista Memory limits Windows XP Memory limits Windows Server 2008 R2 Memory limits Windows Server 2008 Memory limits Windows Server 2003 Windows Desktops Physical Memory Limits: Windows 7 Version Limit in 32-bit Windows Limit in 64-bit Windows Windows 7 Enterprise/Ultimate/Professional 4 GB 192 GB Windows 7 Home Premium 4 GB 16 GB Windows 7 Home Basic 4 GB 8 GB Windows 7 Starter 2 GB 2 GB Physical Memory Limits: Windows Vista Version Limit in 32-bit Windows Limit in 64-bit Windows Windows Vista Enterprise/Ultimate/Business 4 GB 128 GB Windows Vista Home Premium 4 GB 16 GB Windows Vista Home Basic 4 GB 8 GB Windows Vista Starter 1 GB Not applicable Physical Memory Limits: Windows XP Version Limit in 32-bit Windows Limit in 64-bit Windows Windows XP 4 GB 128 GB Windows Vista Starter Edition 521 MB Not applicable Windows Servers Physical Memory Limits: Windows Server 2008 R2 Windows Server 2008 R2 is available only in 64-bit editions. Version Limit in 32-bit Windows Limit in 64-bit Windows Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter/Enterprise n/a 2 TB Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation n/a 8 GB Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard n/a 32 GB Windows HPC Server 2008 R2 n/a 128 GB Windows Web Server 2008 R2 n/a 32 GB Physical Memory Limits: Windows Server 2008 Limits greater than 4 GB for 32-bit Windows assume that PAE is enabled. Version Limit in 32-bit Windows Limit in 64-bit Windows Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter/Enterprise 64 GB 2 TB Windows Server 2008 Standard 4 GB 32 GB Windows HPC Edition n/a 128 GB Windows Web Server 2008 4 GB 32 GB Windows Small Business Server 2008 4 GB 32 GB Physical Memory Limits: Windows Server 2003 Limits greater than 4 GB for 32-bit Windows assume that PAE is enabled. Version Limit in 32-bit Windows Limit in 64-bit Windows Windows Server 2003 with Service Pack 2 (SP2), Datacenter Edition/Enterprise Edition 128 GB 64 GB with 4GT 2 TB Windows Storage Server 2003, Enterprise Edition 8 GB n/a Windows Server 2003 R2 Datacenter Edition, Windows Server 2003 with Service Pack 1 (SP1), Datacenter Edition 128 GB 16 GB with 4GT 1 TB Windows Server 2003 R2 Standard Edition/Standard Edition SP1/Standard Edition SP2 4 GB 32 GB Windows Server 2003, Datacenter Edition 128 GB 64 GB with 4GT 512 GB Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition 32 GB 64 GB with 4GT 64 GB Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition 4 GB 16 GB Windows Server 2003, Web Edition 2 GB n/a Windows Small Business Server 2003 4 GB n/a Windows Compute Cluster Server 2003 n/a 32 GB These tables show a limited version of the data available on Memory Limits for Windows Releases. Learn more about memory. Tell me moreHelp me set it upSend me a quoteRemind me later Email* Org Rate this article * ** *** **** ***** -IB- Acknowledgements: Mark Curtis

	^ Back to contents ^
	5. The sensational new EyePad
Help at hand. Back issues just a click away	Reproduced by kind permission of PRIVATE EYE magazine www.private-eye.co.uk I want one of these Email* Org -IB-

	^ Back to contents ^
	6. Q&A: Why are our office PCs slowing down? Question Mark Hi Mark, Why are our branch office PCs slowing down? We bought them only 6 months ago but already they feel like they are 3 years old!
Help at hand. Back issues just a click away	There are hundreds of possibilities that could generate this tedious PC 'pre-ageing', but it's not helped by the fact that small remote offices are set up in a server-less network in a typical peer-to-peer arrangement. One of the really annoying defaults that has been present in Windows from the Year Dot is that File and Print Sharing arrives already turned on. This is fine for home users with a couple of PCs and a switch or router, because it means that your average family can get started sharing files with relatively little fuss. One could argue that this kind of ease of collaboration is similarly desirable in a small-to-medium business (SMB) or branch office environment. However, SMBs nowadays often justify their own dedicated servers or employ some sort of external shared drive or Network Attached Storage (NAS) for sharing documents, so the Windows native file sharing has become a bit out-dated, not to say dangerous in situations where sharing happens on a Wi-Fi network; it's still unfortunately all too common to find Wi-Fi with zero security configured! But the real downer is that Windows machines in peer configuration soon start to learn about the presence of each others default file shares and printers in the workgroup, even where there are none of these actually active, and that means an increasingly busy network full of redundant traffic. This frequently happens where office users share machines and Windows profiles ad-hoc. In the absence of any central repository, staff just grab the quickest way of sharing their documents via file sharing. You can imagine the network traffic build up between PCs. It's like the start of a summer party. The two or three people who arrived on time can have a clear, easy chat to each other in (probably uncomfortably) quiet surroundings. Add 20 more fashionably late socialites and the efficiency of communication wanes a bit as the number of conversations in the room rises from one to say half a dozen. Chuck in a further 30 loud arrivals from the pub and any meaningful conversations are .... well you know how it goes. Of course parties are about fun, but offices are about efficiency, so turning off the shares is a quick way to clear this traffic jam: Start Control | Panel | Network Connections Under the Properties of whichever connection you are using eg Local Area Network or Wireless, untick File and Print Sharing This is by no means the only bottleneck you should look for. Other issues are: track back to the time when slowness first started (eg new hardware added to the network, software added to PCs, configuration changes) check for users trying to access the same file with non-multi-user applications like Word and Excel check with manufacturers of multi-user applications (eg database) for correct network use/configuration check switches and cables for intermittent connections check what times of day that PCs download Windows updates and anit-virus updates which can generate high traffic remove unnecessary applications on PCs upgrade PCs and/or memory where needed defragment local C: drives Discover answers in more Q&A topics -IB- Found this article helpful? Rate it * ** *** **** ***** Got a "Q" for which you would like an "A" ? Submit your IT question here:

	^ Back to contents ^
	Clicks of the Trade - Save a web page quickly and efficiently --- Quick tips for happier clicks! ---
Help at hand. Back issues just a click away	Sometimes you need to save a web page for later - such as an online order recipt, or subscription details - but without a lot of fuss. The default File | Save Page As menu in most browsers will generate a sub-folder full of the images contained on the page such as receipt_Files. If this folder gets separated from the file of the same name, the page integrity is broken, so remember to keep the page and its folder together. But if all you want to save is the basic text in its original layout (so that order entries line up and so on), it's worth selecting File type = Web Page, HTML only instead of the default Web Page, complete. That way you save an image-free, portable, attachable version that you can call up locally in your browser later without needing the original web site or even an Internet connection. Occasionally some web sites deliver special elements (eg Java) not visible after saving, but for most text elements this method is quick, practical and consumes the minimum of space. ** try it now ** More Clicks of the Trade -IB-

^ Back to contents ^ Overview of InfoBulletin InfoBulletin is written and published by Co-Operative Systems and contains Information Technology tips that we come across during everyday research and support activities and which may be useful in improving your IT operations, either internally or on the Internet. Opinions expressed within InfoBulletin do not necessarily represent the views of Co-Operative Systems. E&OE Viewing IB This bulletin is presented as a Web page (in HTML) that can be read in any standard browser and most email clients. It is written in a compact format for fast viewing, short download time and ease of use for mobile computers. Printing IB If you prefer to read IB on paper (hopefully recycled!), think about pulling down the File | Print Preview menu in your browser and just printing the sheets you want. Implementation InfoBulletin topics can be implemented by Co-Operative Systems on a chargeable basis or via Facilities Management (FM) for those with rolling work programmes.

Subscriptions At any time you can change your subscriber address or stop receiving InfoBulletin altogether by changing your subscriber preferences or by visiting www.coopsys.net/bulletin. Links in the original email message body allow you to forward this issue to a friend, colleague or associate without subscribing them. ^ Back to contents ^ Contact details Sales & Enquiries: 020 7793 0395 team@coopsys.net Support: 020 7793 7877 support@coopsys.net Fax: 020 7735 6472 Fax us via email Web: http://www.coopsys.net Privacy Under no circumstances does Co-Operative Systems supply lists of customers to other organisations. Read our Privacy Policy in full.

Archives and Index Read recent and past issues of InfoBulletins on the Web at www.coopsys.net/ibindex.htm or search our archives and subject index. We hope you found InfoBulletin useful! If you would like to comment on any of the articles or request particular subjects to be covered, mail us here. CO-OPERATIVE SYSTEMS Interpreting Information Technology