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- Certificates: Engineering pushed a new release Friday that includes a slight change to member profiles. You can now download and print any certificates you've earned, suitable for framing, wallpapering your office, or sending out as Christmas cards. They're actually quite attractive. Apropos of that, we would be happy to include, in a future newsletter, a JPG of the first oldtimer (someone who joined EE prior to November 2001) who sends us a picture of him/herself wearing a T-shirt with a certificate printed on it.
Other changes to the AllTopics.jsp page, among others, were done to make Experts Exchange more "Google-friendly" by reducing the number of links on each page.
- New Genius: kretzschmar, the Page Editor for the Delphi topic area, went over the 1,000,000 point mark last week. kretzschmar is truly amazing, besides being one of EE's great people. He joined EE in October, 1998, and all but about 48,000 of his points have been in Delphi. We're honored to have him as a member, and fortunate to have him as a PE. Congratulations, Meikl!
- Correction: In our last issue, we listed a link to an article at ZDNet that had been sent to us by Merete. Since we're a member at ZDNet, neither she nor we realized that the general public couldn't see it without joining. To read the article about Microsoft's SP2 CD, you can read the same article on C|net.
- While we're on the subject: Merete and Nata have both been sending us articles on SP2. Looks like we're all in for a little light reading.
From Microsoft, here's an article on what to know before you download and install SP2.UpdateXP.com provided an overview of SP2.Microsoft published a huge list of support articles on specific SP2 issues. ZDNet published its own list of articles about SP2.TechRepublic had an article a couple of weeks ago that says that a new Internet Explorer flaw affects SP2.A Microsoft MVP has an article about conflicts between SP2 and the latest generation of Intel Pentium and Celeron processors. Even if you don't have one of the processors mentioned, the article is a great read.Frustrated with all of the problems of SP2? This Microsoft article tells you what to do if the SP2 installation fails.Page Editor JOrzech sent in a couple of interesting articles on SP2 as well. One is from a German site, PCWelt, about a fix for a serious security issue; the article is in English. The other article is from InformationWeek, and discusses the time businesses are taking with deploying SP2.
- In the red/green/yellow/blue corner: We're not talking De La Hoya versus Hopkins. We're talking Microsoft versus Cisco in a battle to see whose security architecture will dominate the market. The two companies say they're trying to work out systems that are interoperable, but neither has a great reputation for sharing technology. Read the News.com article about the next title bout.
- Wearing the yellow tights: AOL has decided to not support a Microsoft-backed antispam technology, saying that Microsoft's decision to keep its technology a secret would cause compatability issues. Read about the decision.
Bored with looking over columns of numbers and making them look pretty for the boss? Here's how to make Excel play poker. There's also a brief discussion of blackjack odds. Next challenge: Texas Hold'Em.
Points: 500 Nov 27, 2003 03:52PM PST
Still open: Lexmark Optra S 1855
"I am using Word XP and two Lexmark Optra S 1855 printers. Both printers use the exact same version of the printer driver, which is the newest available from Lexmark's website. Both printers are identical in terms of options, firmware and memory. Word (but not other applications) keeps defaulting to printing "4-UP" (four virtual pages per physical sheet of paper) on just one of the Lexmarks. The other printer defaults to 1-UP printing. Q. -- How do I set the default back to 1-UP printing?"
Points: 500 Aug 19, 2004 01:20PM PDT
Can you help?Still open: "SKU1CA.CAB cannot be found"
From Page Editor byundt: "This is a perennially popular topic -- Office Installer is asking for xyz file (in this case Office 2000 wants an Office 2003 file!?), and I don't have it." In this case, the culprit seems to be Office Small Business, with Excel Project 2000 -- and the pressing the Cancel button several times allows Excel to work.
Points: 500 Sep 15, 2004 04:24PM PDT
Can you help?"I want to set the merge document up so when I run the merge, it also prints 2 leading pages at the beginning of the merged document that list Terms and Programs. The way I have it now, I get the Terms page and the Programs page before every record indtead of just one instance of the Terms / Program pages."
Points: 500 Jul 15, 2004 07:20AM PDT
View the solutionStill open: Circular reference
This one isn't for the faint of heart, but if you know something about financial modelling and understand terms such as debt amortisation profiles, interest accruals and cash flow waterfalls, this one is for you. One caveat: the asker says "Due to the nature of spreadsheet and the people using it, I want to avoid both circular references and VBA."
Points: 500 Sep 15, 2004 07:38AM PDT
Can you help?Compile many files and many sheets into a single file on one sheet
Another oldie but goodie from Excel. "I have some data that is sent to me each week in a file with many tabs. I accumulated many such files and now I'd like to put all the data in a database, which is why I'd like to have it all in one sheet. The sheet name is also important, so I'd like to capture that too. The format on all sheets is always the same for columns A through P. There may be more or less rows in each sheet and file, depending how many records were available."
Points: 300 Sep 10, 2004 08:15AM PDT
View the solutionFrom byundt: brettdj lives in Australia, is 33, an engineer by education, and works in the financial analysis department of a major Australian multi-national. He has made an art-form of solutions involving RegExp (regular expressions) and Dictionary, two powerful objects in VB Script that became available to VBA when people installed Internet Explorer 5. A member of EE since Fall 2002; came here for an answer, liked what he saw, and stayed to play. If you participate in questions with him, you may also pick up some Australian slang.
Registration Date: Sep 9, 2002
Expert Points: 899668
Certificates: Sage, Microsoft Excel; Wizard, Microsoft Office
From JOrzech: R_Rajesh joined EE just a year ago and has already amassed a staggering 510,000 points. Rajesh is only 25 and until recently, he was working as a System Administrator for a small IT company in Bangalore, India. Though his educational background is in electronics, he claims "addiction" to everything related to computers. Rajesh came to EE seeking a solution for a VB program he was writing, tried answering couple of questions, and loved it so much that he decided to stay. Since then, Rajesh has been fascinated with how easy it is to automate Office apps using VBA and he has made every effort to learn it.
Registration Date: Sep 27, 2003
Expert Points: 509941
Certificates: Guru, Microsoft Excel; Master, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Office, Visual Basic
JOrzech describes herself as follows: Word Processing Services Manager and Senior Member of Computer Services at large law firm in Rochester, NY where she has worked for almost 25 years. Sole programmer for firm and all branch offices, "last resort" tech support for Office applications, as well as sole tech support for HotDocs and Adobe applications. She also creates the bulk of the graphic material for the firm and has just returned from Adobe Illustrator CS training. Self-taught in VBA/Word and struggled through it alone for several years until she found EE about a year ago. Joanne has two wonderful sons, 18 and 21. Her eldest is in the Army Reserves and is scheduled to leave for Iraq before the end of the year.
Registration Date: Sep 18, 2002
Expert Points: 395060
Certificates: Wizard, Microsoft Word
byundt describes himself as follows: Biology major passing himself off as an engineer. Designs bioreactors in his day job -- these are used to grow genetically engineered mouse and hamster cells to produce biotech drugs. Took two computer courses in dead languages a long time ago. Started picking up VBA about ten years ago, but have learned an enormous amount through trying to solve EE problems. Has eleven year-old twins, who are just about old enough to start learning Excel. Member of EE since Spring 2003.
Registration Date: March 13, 2003
Expert Points: 1782302
Certificates: Genius, Microsoft Excel; Wizard, Microsoft Office; Master, Microsoft Word, Applications
- The number of resources available to users on both sites will increase
- Site relevance is increased within all major search engines when a site provides links to and from quality resources
Okay, before you get all over me for this, remember that I use Windows, so if I mess up, give me a little break. I came across an article that says that a couple of flaws in the Samba suite of software makes it vulnerable to denial of service attacks, although none have been reported. The flaws have been fixed in the latest version (3.0.7).
According to an article at News.com, there's a security flaw in the way Internet Explorer, Windows XP, and several other Microsoft programs handle JPG images. According to the article, an attacker could "create an image file that would run a malicious program on a victim's computer as soon as the file is viewed." Pretty scary, considering almost every web page that has a photograph uses the JPG format, meaning that just looking at a photograph could allow someone access to your computer. Read the entire article, and check your computer to see if there's something that needs updating.
Another article from News.com tells about a new talking worm that's making the rounds. It's written in Visual Basic, and uses the Windows Speech Engine, which is part of Windows XP, to first play a message and then delete files that cause Windows to fail.
And if you need to read something new with regard to spam, you have to look at this: A Visual History of Spam. And SecurityPipeline.com has an article that says the US government is considering putting a bounty out on spammers. You can also read about a guy who will probably be one of the first to cash in.
| Expert | Certified | in Topic Area |
|---|---|---|
| Erick37 aelatik unknown_routine mladenovicz RanjeetRain SRigney jimhorn sciber_dude peh803 sforcier knightEknight a_twixt_in_the_tale jdlambert1 ram2098 imrancs jltoops kretzschmar DragonSlayer imladris sciuriware Fatal_Exception mdiglio | Wizard Wizard Guru Master Master Master Master Guru Master Master Sage Master Guru Master Master Master Genius Wizard Guru Master Wizard Master | Visual Basic Visual Basic Visual Basic Visual Basic Visual Basic Visual Basic MS Access ASP ASP ASP JavaScript JavaScript Microsoft SQL Microsoft SQL Microsoft SQL Microsoft SQL Delphi Delphi Java Java Windows 2000 Windows 2000 |
| Expert | Certified | in Topic Area |
|---|---|---|
| bcladd drichards Callandor LeeTutor rbkumaran Merete Sembee mvidas jeverist dambuster99 rama_krishna580 hernst42 waygood adg holli fixitben muso j3one jnhorst x_com boulder_bum ihenry | Guru Master Sage Wizard Master Master Sage Wizard Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master | C++ C++ Hardware Windows XP Windows XP Windows XP Exchange_Server Excel Excel Excel C# PHP PHP Programming Perl Flash Flash Flash ASP.NET ASP.NET ASP.NET ASP.NET |
| Expert | Certified | in Topic Area |
|---|---|---|
| Zvonko adamdrayer SjoerdVerweij jdlambert1 bbao rhandels oBdA karel_jespers rhandels conorj sompol_kiatkamolchai SheharyaarSaahil rockmansattic richrumble ozo weed sunnycoder shekerra crissand weed | Guru Master Guru Master Wizard Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Master Sage Guru Master Master Guru | Lotus Notes/Domino Microsoft Network Databases Databases WinNT Net. WinNT Net. Operating Systems Win Server 2003 Win Server 2003 XML JSP Windows ME DreamWeaver Security CGI Macintosh Linux Prog. Email MultiMedia Apps Mac Net. |
Experts Exchange, like any other community, has its own customs and jargon. Below is a list of frequently used acronyms.
EE - Experts Exchange; it denotes either the site itself or the ownership and management
TA - Topic Area; called "Resource Channel" on the site, they were called Topic Areas for so long that everyone still calls them that
CS - Community Support; it refers to either the topic area or to the Moderators, who handle the questions in the CS topic area, as a group.
PE - Page Editor; PEs are members who "watch" their TAs, helping members get answers to their questions. Because they're mostly more senior members, they are familiar with which Experts know which subjects.
MC - Member Comment; a comment left in a profile by either a Moderator, Administrator or Page Editor that is sent directly to the member. They're only visible to the Member and the Mods/Admins/PEs, so don't worry that a lot of people are going to see it.
PAQ - Previously Asked Question; when a question is PAQed, it is closed, and points are refunded or awarded. PAQ also refers to the database of stored questions and answers.
CV - Cleanup Volunteer; a member who spends time going through abandoned questions making recommendations about their closure.
What if you have a question? If you've accepted the wrong answer, or have other questions or concerns about protocol at EE, you can always post in the CS TA or feel free to email the PE for that TA. The email address is always the Page Editor's name @experts-exchange.com. We are here to help!
