From “Office Watch“: There’s a big question mark over the third service pack for Office 2003 – should you install it or not? Microsoft has chosen to make that decision a difficult one for all Office 2003 users.

There’s nothing wrong with Office 2003 Service Pack 3 but you need to be very aware of the limitations imposed on SP3 users.  They aren’t immediate or obvious but might strike you in the future.

SP3 is full of blatant Microsoft cost-cutting measures. Instead of making Office 2003 more secure and fully functional the company chose to block existing Office 2003 features that would have been too expensive for them to fix. It’s cheaper for Microsoft to disable a feature instead of making it work properly.

Microsoft had a pile of security problems with Office 2003, the corporate answer is to disable features with security risks instead of fixing them.

So before you rush off to install SP3 you need to be aware of the changes it brings. Most of them might be considered minor but they might cause a problem if you’re not aware.

Microsoft is deploying SP3 automatically via the Microsoft Update service so you might be in for an unwanted ‘surprise’ when using Office 2003.

The online documentation on these changes isn’t clear. The main description of the reduced functionality in Service Pack 3 is buried deep in a long Knowledge Base article . Even then the descriptions are deliberately obscure. For example “You receive an error message when you try to open a file or to save a file after you install Office 2003 Service Pack 3” doesn’t tell you which file types are affected and nor does the KB article with that title. You have to hunt around for yet another article that finally lists which file types are affected.

Click here to read the entire article. It goes into detail on what Microsoft does with Service Pack 3. Also, don’t confuse this Service Pack 3 with Windows XP Service Pack 3, which I also don’t recommend installing.

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October 3, 2008 (Computerworld) Microsoft has extended the availability of Windows XP on new PCs by six months, the company confirmed today.

Computer makers that “downgrade” machines from Windows Vista Business or Vista Ultimate to Windows XP Professional will be able to obtain media for the latter through the end of July 2009, a Microsoft spokeswoman said Friday.

The new date is a change in policy. Previously, Microsoft had planned to halt XP Professional media shipments to major computer makers after Jan. 31, 2009.

“As more customers make the move to Windows Vista, we want to make sure that they are making that transition with confidence and that it is as smooth as possible. Providing downgrade media for a few more months is part of that commitment,” the spokeswoman said in an e-mail.

The Jan. 31 date is also the last day when smaller companies, dubbed “system builders,” will be allowed to purchase Windows XP licenses to install on the machines they assemble. The system-builder deadline has not changed, the spokeswoman added. It remains Jan. 31.

To confuse matters, some PC makers have long claimed that they would provide XP downgrades on new computers past the Jan. 31 deadline. Last June, for example, Hewlett-Packard Co. talked of a July 2009 cutoff. “HP…will continue to offer this option on its business systems through at least July 30, 2009,” a company spokesman said almost four months ago.

The Microsoft spokeswoman clarified the situation. “The [downgrade] rights don’t go away,” she said via instant messaging in response to follow-up questions. “It’s all about having the media on hand. It’s always been OK to use what you’ve got.”

Microsoft sent Windows XP into semiretirement last June when it stopped selling the aged operating system at retail, withdrew Windows XP Home from use on new PCs and allowed XP Professional to be installed as a Vista downgrade.

The latter tactic takes advantage of Vista’s end-user licensing agreement, which allows users — and in their stead, computer makers — to install Windows XP Professional while also providing media for Vista for a possible upgrade later. More than a third of all new PCs are being downgraded to Windows XP, according to data from a Florida company that operates a community-based performance testing network.

It’s also possible that XP will be widely available long after July 31, 2009. “Downgrade rights do not expire,” Microsoft’s spokeswoman said Friday.

The longer availability puts Microsoft in an unusual position; the new time line will make it possible for users to purchase XP-powered PCs through next July, just months before Microsoft plans to roll out Windows 7, the successor to Vista.

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Just want to tell you about some of the things I use a lot that I think are kinda cool.

Internet Radio – I like going to http://pandora.com and listening to my favorite music. What’s nice about Pandora is that I can enter an artist I like and it will create a playlist of music from artists similar to the one I named. It also allows me to select different genres to play from. As the songs play, I can “vote” by giving the song a thumbs-up or a thumbs-down. If I give it an thumbs-up, then future sets of songs are more likely to have similar musical traits. If I give it a thumbs-down the song will be removed from the play list and future sets of songs are less likely to have similar musical traits. Ultimately what I end up with is a play list of favorite songs. These can’t be downloaded and I can’t rewind but you can skip a song, actually you can skip 6 songs per hour and those songs won’t be played again for at least 4 hours.

Internet surfing safety –WOT – Web of Trust: WOT is a free Internet security addon for your browser. It will keep you safe from online scams, identity theft, spyware, spam, viruses and unreliable shopping sites. WOT warns you before you interact with a risky website. It’s easy and it’s free. Pops up and shows either green, yellow or red which lets you know if the site you’re on can be trusted or not.

Giving and Getting – Freecycle: (http://www.freecycle.org/) The Freecycle Network™ is made up of 4,614 groups with 5,910,000 members across the globe. It’s a grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (& getting) stuff for free in their own towns. It’s all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills. Membership is free. If you have items that you’d like to get rid of, or items you are looking for that others may be getting rid of, join freecycle. You’ll get listings of items that others in your area are getting rid of, or you can post items you’re getting rid of and others will claim them. They’ll contact you and come pick up the item. It’s a great exchange process.

Recording and Uploading Video – The Flip Video Camera – Simple to use, pocket-sized camcorder with one-touch recording and digital zoom. It holds 60 minutes of full VGA-quality video on 2GB of built-in memory; no tapes or additional memory cards required. It has a USB arm that plugs directly into your computer for easy viewing and sharing. It’s built-in software lets you easily e-mail videos, upload to YouTube and AOL, and capture still photos from video. It’s a no-frills camera that does one thing and does it well. When you’re done recording, just plug it into a USB port on your computer and upload the video.

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In this day of multiple computers, there usually comes a time when you need a file or to look at an e-mail when you are away from home only to realize that it’s on your home computer.  Or, you may be visiting a friend when you remember an e-mail you had meant to send and you need to access your e-mail program. When that happens to me, I turn to my remote desktop software LogMeIn, which allows me to access my home computer to find those files or send that e-mail just as if I were at home.

Remote desktop software, such as LogMeIn or GoToMyPC, installs on the computer you want to connect to and then allows you to connect from any internet connection. They are very secure so the connection is locked up with security (you’ll need to be careful when using an internet connection on a public computer since you don’t know what kind of malware is on it). I have been using LogMeIn myself for several years and have been very happy with it.

LogMeIn offers a free version for remote access which is a fine version if you want to run programs or check e-mail on your home computer. If you need to do more, like transfer files, print or share your share files with someone else, you can upgrade to the Pro version for $69.95/year compared to GoToMyPC which goes for $179.40/year. What does one do that the other doesn’t? Nothing really. Some say GoToMyPC is faster but I haven’t really noticed a difference, at least none that would entice me to pay the extra cost.  And, for most people, the free version of LogMeIn will work just fine.

So, when I need that file and it’s at home and I’m not, I just connect to my computer and get it, by using LogMeIn.

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