Skype Crashes After Upgrade to Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx

After upgrading your desktop or laptop to Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx you may experience the following symptoms:

• Reduction in audio quality (jittery calls)
• Crashing after receiving an Instant Message
• Crashing when trying to send an Instant Message
• Slow program functionality

All of the above issues can be resolved by removing Skype and ensuring that the newest version is installed (2.1.0.81 at time of writing)

- See more 

A simple MySQL Backup Tool

If you administer a website (or indeed a number of websites) you may need a tool which will allow you to simply backup a MySQL database on a regular basis.

Although there are a number of tools available online, none quite fit our needs. As a result, we’ve quickly written a simple MySQL backup tool in PHP.

Features

• Tested compatible with PHP version 5.2.14 and MySQL 5.0
• Allows for SQL and ZIP export of a single MySQL database
• Lists previous backups made

This is version 0.1a – it is no doubt buggy. We would appreciate any feedback if you do decide to use the tool.

- See more 

Briefly unavailable for scheduled maintenance. Check back in a minute

This WordPress error message appears when a plugin update fails half way through.

The fix is extremely simple:

• FTP to your WordPress installation directory
• Delete the .maintenance file at the root wordpress folder (where wp-config.php lives)
• Login and retry the plugin operation

The issue should be resolved.

- See more 

Updating Office 2000

If like us, you still encounter Office 2000 out in the field, you may find it needs updating from time to time. Sadly, the necessary updates are not all available from Microsoft.

You can download these updates here:
Office 2000 SR-1 administrator updates (O2KSR1aDL.exe)
Office 2000 Update: Service Pack 2 – SP2 (sp2upd.exe)
Office 2000 Update: Service Pack 3 – SP3 (O2kSp3.exe)

Hope this helps all of you out there still using/supporting Office 2000.

- See more 

Free alternatives to Norton Internet Security and McAfee Internet Security

Both Norton Internet Security and the McAfee Internet Security suite are excellent products for ensuring your PC is protected while online. Both offer anti-virus tools, spyware blockers, trojan detection etc. However, the fees associated with keeping them up to date (often £20-30 annually) can be prohibitive.

There is an alternative in the world of anti-virus however, and this comes in the form of AVG.

The AVG free edition is just that – free. It does have a few limitations:

• Less protection – AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition 8.0 provides only base level protection against viruses, spyware and safe searching. It does not provide safe surfing (drive-by download protection) nor protection from crackers, keyloggers, spam, phishing attacks and malicious file downloads that can come through instant messaging and attachments from seemingly friendly sources. This protection is only available in the commercial versions of AVG products.

- See more 

Learn the 5 Mistakes Most Everyone Makes…

Watching the net have made an interesting post about making the mistakes that everyone makes with their computer – but shouldn’t!

All of the points made are accurate, and we would recommend making the changes discussed.

http://www.watchingthenet.com/computer-problem-tips-are-you-messing-up-your-computer-learn-the-5-mistakes-most-everyone-makes.html

- See more 

Free alternative to Norton Ghost and Acronis True Image

Norton Ghost is an extremely useful utility that allows you to duplicate one hard drive to another. In How to install/replace a PATA (IDE) hard drive we shared a video showing how to physically replace an ATA or IDE hard drive.

But what about your old data? Well, you can copy this from your old hard drive with a number of utilites, Norton Ghost and Acronis True Image being some of the more popular commerical programs.

You can use a nifty utility called Clonezilla to do this for free.

- See more