International Domains Get ICANN Thumbs UpStarting in mid-November, countries and territories will be able to apply to show domain names in their native language, a major technical tweak to the Internet designed to increase language accessibility.

On Friday, the Internet's addressing authority approved a Fast-Track Process for applying for an IDN (Internationalized Domain Name) and will begin accepting applications on Nov. 16.

The move comes after years of technical testing and policy development, said the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which held a meeting in Seoul this week.

Currently, domain names can only be displayed using the Latin alphabet letters A-Z, the digits 0-9 and the hyphen, but in future countries will be able to display country-code Top Level Domains (cc TLDs) in their native language. ccTLDs are those that have a two-letter country designation at the end of a domain name.

In reality, the new domain names will be stored in the DNS as sequences of letters and numbers beginning xn-- in order to maintain compatibility with the existing infrastructure. The characters following the xn-- will be used to encode a sequence of Unicode characters representing the country name.

One of the primary concerns with implementing IDNs is the security and stability of the Domain Name System (DNS). That system enables the translation of domain names written with characters and digits into IP (Internet Protocol) addresses, which can then be queried by a Web browser.

ICANN said it would initially allow for a "limited" number of IDNs, which are subject to ICANN's approval and stability testing. Still, there are likely to be hiccups, ICANN warned.

"The usability of IDNs may be limited, as not all application software is capable of working with IDNs," ICANN said in a59-page proposal dated Sept. 30 that describes the Fast Track process. "It is up to each application developer to decide whether or not they wish to support IDNs. This can include, for example, browsers, email clients, and sites where you sign up for a service or purchase a product and in that process need to enter an e-mail address."

ICANN has set some language restrictions for IDNs: they must be in an official language of a country or territory and have legal status or at minimum "serve as a language of administration."

According to the proposal, ICANN will charge registries US$26,000 for an evaluation processing fee, which can be paid in the local currency. ICANN would also like an annual contribution fee of 3 percent of a registries revenue, which can be as low as 1 percent for low-volume registries. For both fees, registries can request a fee waiver, ICANN said.

Labels: Internet

As expected, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, more commonly referred to as ICANN, approved the use of non-Latin characters in domain names. Concluding a week of meetings in Seoul, South Korea, the ICANN vote takes the Web a step closer to actually living up to the 'World Wide' part of its name.

The move comes rather quickly in the wake of the United States loosening its draconian control of ICANN. It was less than a month ago that the United States released sole oversight of ICANN and turned it into a global, private-sector led organization.

Prior to the vote ICANN CEO Rod Beckstrom shared the importance of the decision. "This represents one small step for ICANN, but one big step for half of mankind who use non-Latin scripts, such as those in Korea, China and the Arabic speaking world as well as across Asia, Africa, and the rest of the world."

Expanding the Alphabet

Web sites have been able to use some international alphabets for part of the URL, but until this decision the domain suffix--the part at the end like .com or .us--has been a victim of its roots. It may be called the World Wide Web, but it was born in the United States, controlled by the United States, and the domain naming conventions have been a slave to their heritage.

ICANN will begin accepting requests for domains using traditional or simplified Chinese, Russian Cyrillic, Hebrew, Hindi, Arabic and other international alphabets, but only for a limited set of top level domains (TLD). The initial approval applies to regionally-controlled country-code TLD's only. So, international characters will be accepted for domains like .ru (Russia), .cn (China) and other similar domains, but not for the generic TLD's like .com and .net...at least not yet.

Potential Risks and Concerns

The decision on using international characters for generic domains is still a year or two off. ICANN has to wrestle with the implications of having .com being able to be expressed in multiple alphabets. Should an entity like PC World automatically be granted its pcworld.com domain in all available alphabets, or would each international incarnation of the domain be a separate Web presence? ICANN members don't currently agree on how to address that issue.

The use of international alphabets also poses some other potential problems. As far back as 2002 security researchers recognized that similar-looking characters, or homoglyphs, could be transposed to spoof a domain name. The concept is similar to techniques used to make more complex passwords or in hacker-speak. For example, my name could be represented by T0ny Br@dl3y.

It is fairly obvious that the example uses numbers and alternate characters, but some international alphabet characters may appear virtually identical to Latin alphabet characters in some fonts. So pcworld.com in the standard English alphabet will take you to the official PC World domain, but transposing an alternate international character for the 'c' or the 'o' could result in a unique domain URL which could be used to create a malicious spoof of the pcworld.com web site.

It's a Small World, After All

The United States has a generally high opinion of itself. We have a tendency to call things 'World' when they are really United States-centric, like the World Series going on now between the Yankees and the Phillies. No other countries were invited to participate, so who's to say the winner of the World Series is actually the best team in the world?

The potential concerns aside, the move by ICANN is a step in the right direction. The Internet just turned 40 years old. It has transformed the way people communicate and do business around the world. As it turns out, a good percentage of the world doesn't read, write, speak, or think in English. It's about time that the World Wide Web be more accessible to people outside of the Western hemisphere.

Labels: Internet

In case you missed it, Windows 7 is available now. October 22^nd was marked with a moderate amount of hoopla to introduce the new flagship operating system. Now, users are faced with the task of not only deciding whether or not to upgrade, but of choosing which of the many variations of Windows 7 to install.

Microsoft has 6 different versions of Windows 7 available: Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional, Ultimate, and Enterprise. The Windows 7 Starter version is aimed primarily at low-end netbook devices, and the Windows Home Basic version is only available in emerging markets, so we can rule those two out right away.

Microsoft thinks that it is doing you a favor by essentially making Windows Home Premium the de facto version. A quick browse through the systems available from Best Buy or Amazon shows that almost every system available now comes pre-installed with Windows Home Premium, with a significant percentage being the 64-bit version of Windows Home Premium.

Windows Home Premium is OK, but it lacks key features. Microsoft has this habit of adding all kinds of eye candy and multimedia bells and whistles to the home version, but leaving out important security features and customization capabilities. I chalk it up to an effort to provide a dummy-proof entertainment system and be more like Apple, but the result is that consumers get an inferior version of Windows that doesn't come close to the Mac OS X experience.

Microsoft isn't Apple and Windows isn't Mac. If Microsoft focused more on providing the best version of Windows for consumers and less on trying to be cool or dummy proof, it would be doing itself and you both a favor.

Microsoft aims the cream of the crop of the security features at enterprise customers. Granted, they need them as well, but enterprises tend to have IT administrators and technical support personnel who install, manage, and oversee firewall and antivirus products, monitor the network for outbreaks, and provide security remediation and cleanup when necessary. Home users don't have those resources so they need the operating system to be as secure as possible by default.

Home users should have Windows 7 Ultimate in order to have the full range of Windows 7 features and capabilities. Laptop users in particular should upgrade to Windows 7 Ultimate so they can take advantage of BitLocker Disk Encryption to protect the data on the laptop in the event that it is lost or stolen.

Small businesses are more or less ignored by Microsoft. They are not an enterprise or a consumer. Microsoft intends the Windows 7 Professional version for small and medium business customers. Windows 7 Professional has some enhancements such as the ability to join a Windows network domain, but still lacks key features like BitLocker, as well as the enterprise capabilities like DirectAccess and Branch Cache.

Granted, small and medium business customers need to have a Windows Server 2008 domain environment to take advantage of these advanced Windows 7 features, but it is worth it for organizations with remote and roaming workers or branch locations. To gain access to these features, I suggest small and medium businesses also invest in Windows 7 Ultimate.

There you have it. If I were calling the shots at Microsoft we could instantly narrow the field down to three options: Windows 7 Starter for netbooks, Windows 7 Enterprise for large corporate customers, and Windows 7 Ultimate for everyone else.

If you are going to spend the time and money to upgrade to Windows 7, you may as well invest a little extra and get the version that has all of the features, and capabilities rather than choosing one with limited functionality. You'll thank me later.

Labels: Windows 7

This year marks the tenth anniversary for VMware Workstation, which has now been optimized for Windows 7 with its latest release.

VMware's virtualization solutions allow developers, quality analysis, help agents, and other professionals run many "guest" operating systems on a single host computer. VMware Workstation 7, released Tuesday, adds Windows 7 support, enhanced 3D graphics, and more.

The product fully supports Windows 7 in either 32-bit or 64-bit modes. It even works with Flip 3D and Aero Peek to show virtual-machine activity in real time. Improved virtualization of 3D graphics means that VMware 7 virtual machines can handle applications that require Windows Aero, DirectX 9.0c Shader Model 3 and OpenGL 2.1. A single virtual machine can now make use of up to four virtual CPUs and up to 32 Gbytes of RAM. This release also included a number of features aimed specifically at software developers.

The product is available for download from www.vmware.com/workstation and also in retail stores for a suggested price of $189. Current VMware users can upgrade for $99.

Labels: Windows 7

Labels: antivirus

Some users trying to upgrade from Windows Vista to Windows 7 have seen their PCs crippled by an endless series of reboots, according to reports on Microsoft's support forum.

A Microsoft engineer writing on the same forum said the company was investigating users' problems, but downplayed them as "isolated issues."

Users began posting messages about the endless reboots Friday, saying that the Windows 7 installation would hang two-thirds through the upgrade. They reported a message on their machines that claimed the upgrade had been unsuccessful and that Vista would be restored. Instead, their PCs again booted to the Windows 7 setup process, failed, then restarted the cycle.

"My upgrade failed in [the] last step," said a user identified as "Manjigani" in a thread titled "Windows 7 -- Install Message -- Upgrade Unsuccessful" on the Windows 7 support forum. "And now it is in continuous loop. I let it run overnight hoping that it will fix itself, but no luck. I am stuck in limbo."

"All the promises of stability and simplicity, and now there are so many problems with installation," bemoaned another used, "Derrty," on the same thread. "I can't even access my laptop nor do I have the ability to roll my system back to Vista. All indications are the install removed any trace of Vista."

Other than trying to upgrade from Vista to Windows 7, there did not seem to be any common characteristics of the computers or the users' actions. Some said that they had purchased a Windows 7 upgrade electronically from Microsoft's online store, others said they had downloaded the upgrade from Digital River, the Minneapolis-based company that fulfills Microsoft's $29.99 offer to college students, while still others said they had bought a retail copy of the new operating system at stores like Best Buy.

Users vented their rage online in scores of messages.

"How on earth is Windows 7 so poorly manufactured that there even NEEDS to be a solution to installation issues?" asked "Chimaera717," who later reported receiving a marketing message from Microsoft while struggling with the endless reboots. "I just got an e-mail from Windows, titled 'Windows 7: Your PC, Simplified.' I really want to e-mail them back and say 'Windows 7: My PC, Crippled'."

Microsoft support engineers entered the thread Sunday, asking for information from affected users, such as the version of Vista running before the Windows 7 upgrade attempt, and what, if any, antivirus software was on the machine.

Sunday afternoon, a support engineer named "Keith" said that some users' problems may be related to the optical drive speed when creating an install DVD from a disk image downloaded from the Microsoft store or through Digital River. "Make sure you are burning the image at the slowest speed possible to avoid corruption on the installation disc," said Keith.

"Digital River and Microsoft are investigating reports of this issue," he added. "This appears to be a series of isolated issues that are often related to the user's Internet provider or installed third-party software."

Labels: Windows 7

The curtain has been raised and the confetti has fallen. Windows 7 is here. After the problems with the launch of Windows Vista-- both real and perceived-- many users are cautious about jumping on Windows 7 too quickly.

Windows 7 offers little more than incremental improvements and cosmetic enhancements over Windows Vista, and Windows Vista users may be wise to simply hold off until its time for a new PC. But the majority of users are still using Windows XP and even Vista users have reason to embrace Windows 7. Let's look at 5 reasons why you should make the switch to Windows 7 today.

1. Vista haters. Whether you are one of the nearly 19 percent of consumers who are actually running Windows Vista and don't like it, or part of the larger crowd of those who hate Windows Vista purely based on anecdotal stories and ‘I'm a Mac' ads from Apple, Windows 7 is not Windows Vista.

The two most common complaints about Windows Vista are poor device driver support and annoyance over the UAC (user account control) pop-up alerts. Windows 7 has vastly superior device support, and Microsoft has modified the functionality of UAC to provide the user with more control over the alert prompts.

2. XP diehards. Security is arguably the best reason for a Windows XP user to make the switch. A lot has changed since the Clinton-era. Windows 7 has UAC, ASLR (address space layout randomization), and DEP (data execution prevention) in addition to improved operating system kernel protection. Certain versions of Windows 7 also include BitLocker and BitLocker-to-Go encryption.

There are also a number of improvements in the user interface that make it simpler and more intuitive to work with the operating system. The Windows Action Center, improved data backup, Blu-ray disc support, and jump lists stand out as good reasons to make the switch.

3. Home networking. Networking Windows-based desktops together in the home has theoretically been possible since Windows 3.11. However, it has been easier said than done and has come with certain security tradeoffs depending on which version of Windows you're trying to network.

Microsoft is offering Windows 7 in a family pack with 3 licensed copies to allow families to upgrade all of the systems in the home at a discount. If you take advantage of that, you can also take advantage of Home Groups which greatly simplify the process of sharing data and other resources between Windows 7 systems while also providing better protection to prevent guests or unauthorized users from being able to access those same resources.

4. Media sharing. Since the days of Windows XP a lot has changed in terms of digital media. MP3's are quickly replacing compact discs as the primary music format, and computers with TV tuners can act as DVR's (digital video recorders).

Windows 7 makes it fairly seamless and intuitive to share audio and video media between the various devices on the network. You can access and share libraries, play audio and video files to remote systems on the network, copy recorded shows from one system to another, and more with relative ease.

5. Go with the flow. When I was a teen lusting after my first computer, I wanted a Mac. The mother of a friend of mine worked for Apple so I got to play with the first-generation Mac at his house and that is what I wanted. My mother nixed that plan because she pointed out that they used PC's at her work, and my uncle was a programmer on a PC, and we had family and friends with PC's. The logic was that by getting a PC I would have more resources available to me than if I went with the obscure, albeit cooler, Mac.

Fast forward a few years and I was still trying to be a non-conformist even while using a PC. I ran the IBM OS/2 operating system on an AMD-based system (before it was the household name it is now). I used a non-HP printer and a non-Hayes modem. I made sure my sound card was not from Creative Labs. What I found was that all of that really just made my life more difficult trying to find drivers and make it all play nicely together.

So-- reason number 5 to embrace Windows 7 is to go with the flow. Between Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7, the Microsoft operating system dominates nearly 95 percent of the operating system market share. Now that Windows 7 is out, Microsoft and third-party software providers will be quick to drop support and development for Windows XP.

Labels: Windows 7

Labels: Windows 7

Labels: Google

Labels: Tips

It's National Cyber Security Awareness Month, and Google wants to remind you of a basic tenet of online security: passwords. Considering that October started off with a security breach that struck more than 10,000 Hotmail accounts, a security review may not be such a bad idea. Michael Santerre, Google's Consumer Operations Associate detailed Google's password advice in a recent blog post.

Some of Santerre's precautions are things you've likely heard many times before: don't use personal information like your name or birth date, and don't use simple passwords like "password" or "letmein." Instead, Santerre says you should use a unique password for every site, one that includes a mixture of numbers, letters, and symbols. This will help protect you from dictionary attacks, where a hacker uses a program that tries millions of word and letter combinations to guess your password. But keeping track of so many passwords can be tough; Santerre advises you to write your secret codes down or keep them in a computer file, just don't give your file an obvious name like 'paswords.doc.' or 'Fort Knox.txt.'

Finally, keep your password recovery options up to date so that a hacker can't take over an abandoned e-mail account. Let's say your ilovegmail@gmail.com account uses ilovehotmail@hotmail.com as the secondary e-mail address for the password recovery option. If you've forgotten about that account, a hacker could sign up for ilovehotmail@hotmail.com and end up hacking into your Gmail account. This is exactly how a French hacker gained access to Twitter's company files earlier this year.

If you're worried about your password security, here are a few more tips:

1) Use a combination where you substitute letters for numbers, words for numbers and include random capitalization. For example, 19 Peach Place becomes 0ne9peacHpl!--note the random exclamation mark at the end.

2) Create a sentence and then pull the first letter from each word, substituting numbers or even symbols were possible. Turning a sentence like, "Zachary Taylor was the twelfth president of the United States," into ZTwt12potUS.

3) Use a random password generator. You can find several online like Strong Password Generator, .

4) If you've chosen your own number, letter, and symbol combination, but aren't sure how strong it is, run it through Microsoft's Password Checker.

5) So now you've got a strong password for all your important e-mail and banking accounts, but how are you going to keep track of all of these endless codes? Consider using a password manager, or just keep them on a piece of paper in the physical world--just don't attach the list to your computer.

Labels: Tips

Google on Wednesday announced that its search results now feature an option allowing users to view formatted PDFs from within their browser.

Although Google's search results have long featured a "View as HTML" option for documents using the Portable Document Format standard, the company in a blog post said that "option loses some of the formatting from the original PDF, such as graphics, tables, fonts, and other elements."

To solve the issue, a new "Quick View" option has been added to some PDFs in search results. When a user clicks on the link, the full PDF file is displayed in the browser with all its formatting intact. The viewer is based on the same service built into Gmail and Google Docs

According to Google, it has been adding the Quick View feature to results since July. Currently, more than 50 percent of the PDFs in Google's index display that viewing option.

Google also said it plans to use the viewer for "more documents and file types."

Labels: Google

If you want to a see a blank look on a student's face, ask him about the Dewey Decimal library classification system. For better or for worse, the Internet often becomes an alternative to a library's card catalogs. But how can you trust what you read on the Web?

"Frankly, this is my main concern, along with stumbling onto inappropriate material," admits Bonnie Marks, a mother of two. "Just because someone publishes something on their home page, it doesn't make it gospel-many kids don't know this."

Learning where to go and how to appropriately use information that is on the Internet can be challenging to both parents and students. The following is a look at some of the most comprehensive-and reliable-educational Web sites a student can bookmark and use to research school projects and homework assignments.

MSN Encarta

The free MSN Encarta site features more than 4,500 articles pooled from Microsoft Encarta, the award-winning electronic reference library, and comes with dictionaries, maps, fast facts, interactive quizzes, handy homework tools, and more.

Refdesk

Since 1995, Refdesk.com, which stands for "reference desk," has served as a one-click springboard to many of the Web's top dictionaries, encyclopedias, calculators, atlases, news headlines, and search engines. The site also includes a handy "homework helper" section that provides help in all subjects to students in every grade.

HowStuffWorks

Ever wanted to know why earthquakes happen? How CD burners work? What the sun is made of? These questions, and a large amount of others related to computers/electronics, automobiles, science, entertainment, and people, are all answered at this award-winning Web site. Simply type a query into the search window or peruse the topics by category. Extras include free newsletters, surveys, and printable versions of all answers.

Fact Monster

This site features an almanac, atlas, dictionary and encyclopedia made especially for kids, as well as handy search engine and layout designed for easy fact-finding. Check out fun features such as Biographies of the Presidents, the Geography Hall of Fame, and the Tallest Buildings Slideshow.

Download.com

Consider Download.com the ultimate file repository that links to literally tens of thousands of downloadable free or shareware programs. This includes utilities for Windows, Macintosh, and Linux, Internet tools, desktop dictionaries and language translators, Pocket PC and Palm applications, and of course, computer games. Visitors can search by typing in a keyword or by perusing the many sections.

Novelguide.com

The Web's answer to those black- and yellow-striped Cliff Notes is Novelguide.com, a reliable and free source for literary analysis of classic and contemporary books such as Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn and Fyodor Dostoyevsky's Notes from the Underground. The site offers character profiles, metaphor and theme analysis, and author biographies.

Math.com

This site provides help in a number of mathematics-related subjects, including basic grade-school math, calculus, algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and statistics. Practice exercises are automatically graded, plus this free site also features a glossary, calculators, homework tips, math games, and lesson plans for teachers.

FreeTranslation

Sprechen Sie Deutsch? Perfect for language studies, this handy Web site automatically converts text from one language into another, such as English to Simplified Chinese or French to English. Simply type and paste up to 10,000 characters (about 1,800 words) into the search window and then select the desired language. Alternatively, you can cut and paste a Web URL to convert the entire site.

Shakespeare Online

This Web site can be filed in the "where was this when I was a kid?" category. On the aptly named Shakespeare Online site, visitors can read every play or poem from the world's most celebrated writer and, more importantly, make some sense of his works with free analysis, Old English language translations, and famous quotes.

Science Made Simple

Science classes-including the ubiquitous science project-aren't as easy for some to grasp as for others. At Science Made Simple, kids of all ages can get detailed answers to many of science's questions, read current news articles related to science, get ideas on school projects, and take advantage of unit conversion tables. Users can also find out if their school's textbooks pass the test.

Article written by Marc Saltzman and adapted from an original piece from Microsoft Home Magazine.

Labels: Hotmail

Microsoft's new free Security Essentials looks like it can get the job done, according to new scanning tests conducted by AV-Test.org.

The free standalone antivirus product has caused a stir since its Tuesday release, as might be expected when the words "Microsoft" and "free" are involved. In a post on the day of its launch, I referenced AV-Test performance results from a MSE beta. We now have new results from tests conducted this week against the final product (available for download), and overall MSE looks good:

Malware detection: MSE detected 98.44 percent of AV-Tests's collected zoo of 545,034 viruses, worms, backdoors, bots and Trojans, an entirely respectable showing. However, it didn't do nearly as well when it came to detecting adware and spyware, such as bank info stealers, and detected only 90.95 percent of the 14,222 samples.

As expected, MSE detected 100 percent of the samples in the Wildlist. Most reputable AV apps detect all the Wildlist samples.

Dynamic/behavioral detection: If a program includes behavioral detection, it can identify malware based solely on how it acts on a PC. It's a useful feature for detecting brand-new malware that doesn't yet have a signature.

AV-Test found that MSE doesn't include any effective behavioral detection. However, AV-Test's Andreas Marx noted that's typically the case for standalone antivirus programs, and that you'll generally need to buy a security suite to get the feature.

Or, you can pair your free or paid standalone AV program with PC Tools' free Threatfire, which adds an impressive layer of behavioral detection to your security arsenal.

Disinfection: MSE was able to clean up all of the active components from 25 different test infections, meaning the malware was effectively neutered. As is usually the case, the program often left behind some traces of the infection, such as registry entries or a turned-off Windows firewall.

Rootkit removal: MSE did well here. It identified and removed all 25 rootkits (stealth technology used to hide other malware) used in the tests.

Scan speed: When I compared the MSE beta to other free (and finished) AV apps over the summer, it came in last for scanning speed. In these latest tests, Marx says that MSE scan speed "is quite OK when compared with other AV products" - not the fastest, but not the slowest.

False alarms: Security Essentials didn't put up any false positives for any of 600,000 known clean files used by Windows, Office and other common apps. However, as Marx notes, most of those files come from Microsoft, so a false positive would have been surprising.

Overall, these results show that Security Essentials holds its own as a free standalone antivirus app. As with most other options in that category, it doesn't provide a firewall, behavioral detection, or other security extras. But since Vista and Windows 7 already include a two-way firewall, and you can add top-notch behavioral protection with another free app, MSE looks like a good budget choice for baseline antivirus protection.

Labels: antivirus