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Official NewsletterSouthEastern MichiganComputer Organization, Inc.Volume 38October 2013Number 10IN THIS ISSUESEMCO Emergency Meeting Notes. 3Free Utilities to Boot and Repair “Crashed” PCs, by Ira Wilsker. 4Simple Tips for Microsoft Word, by Sandy Berger. 7DHS, FBI, Warn About Threats to Android Mobile Devices,by Ira Wilsker. 8Sources of Support for Linux, Open Source Software,by Bill Wayson. 12Protect Your Online Search and E-mail Privacy, by Ira Wilsker. 13The Mac Corner, by Danny Uff. 16SEMCO Emergency Meeting. 17Board Meeting Minutes, by Carol Sanzi. 18SIGs: Computing, Techniques, Advice, Linux, Programming. 19DATA BUS Deadline. 19Other Groups Calendar of Events. 20Computer Resource People. 21SEMCO Calendar. 22Map & Directions to SEMCO Meeting at ESD. 231

SEMCO OFFICERSPresidentMike BaderVice-PresidentRichard JacksonSecretaryCarol SanziTreasurerBrian BrodskyMembers-at-Large of the Board of DirectorsBob ClyneRichard Fink(586) 447-6683(248) 546-3694(586) 739-7256(248) 391-9125(810) 387-3101(248) 752-6762NEWSLETTER STAFFPublications Committee ChairInterim EditorEvents ResearchProofreadersPosition OpenBob ClyneBetty MacKenzieBeth FordyceKen PhillipsPaul Baecker(810) 387-3101(586) 254-0677(734) 453-0349(734) 654-3679SIG (SPECIAL INTEREST GROUP) IG-LinuxSIG-ProgrammingTom CallowPosition OpenBob ClyneBrian BrodskyRichard Jackson(248) 642-5770 (9–5)(810) 387-3101(248) 391-9125(248) 546-3694The SouthEastern Michigan Computer Organization, Inc. (SEMCO) is a non-profit, 501(c)(3),group dedicated to providing information, education and a forum to computer users (professionaland amateur) and other interested individuals. Membership in SEMCO is open to all individuals18 years or older. Persons under 18 years may become members through the sponsorship ofa parent or guardian. Dues of 30/year include monthly DATA BUS and free personal ads.All SEMCO correspondence should be addressed toSEMCO, P.O. Box 707, Bloomfield Hills, MI 48303-0707Web site: http://www.semco.orgE-mail: semco@semco.orgDATA BUS is published monthly by SouthEastern Michigan Computer Organization, Inc.(SEMCO) as its official newsletter. Mail DATA BUS newsletter copy to: Bob Clyne,130 First Street, Yale, MI 48097; or e-mail: clyne@mich.com. The Editor isresponsible for contents and control of the DATA BUS. Materials published herein may beused for non-commercial purposes only, without further permission of SEMCO or the authors,except as noted, providing credit is given to the author and source, i.e. DATA BUS, and issuedate. Entire contents copyright 2013 SouthEastern Michigan Computer Organization, Inc.Your mailing label and membership card list the month and year your membership expires.Newsletters will not be sent after the month of expiration. Back issues may not be available.Renew your membership as early as possible.This publication was created using Adobe InDesign CS6donated by Adobe Systems, Inc.2

SEMCOEmergency Meeting NotesSeptember 8, 2013Tom Callow moderated the EmergencyMeeting, leading the discussion ofthe crisis that faces SEMCO’s future.He stated that the critical challengesfacing SEMCO are threefold: 1) lackof volunteers, 2) declining membership,3) not enough speakers to cover 2 SIGmeetings.Jim Rarus questioned the status ofother Computer Organizations. RichardJackson reported that many of them facethe same challenges as SEMCO.Al Gruber stated that SEMCOshould seek both younger new membersbecause they are energetic and ambitious,and older members with more diverseinterests. He said SEMCO needed tochange its mission to attract youngermembers by offering programmingSIGs, game programming, Dungeonsand Dragons, and presentations on iPadand Android instruction, Windows 7and 8 presentations, and discussionson GPS’s, smart phones, and otherelectronics. Al Gruber feels old folkswould join SEMCO if they were offeredsuch things as investment strategies,genealogy, nostalgia, and antique roadshows.A l G r u b e r f e e l s S E M C O ’simmediate actions should includevolunteers to repair the e-mail group,publicize the SIGs as a cooperativegroup, give 15 minute presentations,sponsor & publicize some inexpensiveold folks classes, sponsor programmingcontests at high schools and collegeswith a 1,000 prize, create a gurutweet, offer stipends for big-companyprogrammer type lecturers and offer3student programmers a free SEMCOmembership.Jack Baum suggested thatmembership could be increased bymeeting at a more convenient locationthan the ESD offices in Southfield.It was suggested that SEMCO couldhave joint meetings with other clubs, bemore visible at local libraries, or havemeetings every other month.On the issue of not having enoughspeakers, the members discussedwhether to change the SEMCO Sundaymeeting format to have one presentationrather than two, with a social periodbeing held at the end of the singlemeeting. The single meeting could belonger than the current SIG-Computingmeeting. Tom Callow cautioned whilesome leeway in the length of themeeting would be advantageous, itmight be harder to get outside speakerswilling to talk for much longer than anhour, and having inside speakers havingto prepare much longer presentationswould not make their presentationseasier to prepare for.The members present were polledand it appeared that changing to aone‑presentation format would probablynot significantly reduce attendance atthe Sunday meetings.A discussion took place regardingthe value of the DATA BUS. Mr. Callowstated that he believed maintainingpublication of the DATA BUS wascritical to the continued existence ofSEMCO. Richard Jackson pointedout that the average attendance atmeetings was 25 to 30 members whilethe current membership stood at 72.This means that the primary benefitfor more than half the members is thenewsletter. If SEMCO eliminated theDATA BUS, it could lose more than

half of its membership and more thanhalf of the annual dues it received fromits members.The members discussed whetherthe work of producing the DATA BUScould be divided among more than oneperson. There would be difficulties,since the editing function impacted thelength of articles and making them fitthe layout of the DATA BUS, as well asthe quality of the content. The membersalso discussed methods of reducing theamount of work needed to publish thenewsletter, such as going to a full-pageformat or distributing the DATA BUSelectronically, and changing the formator delivery method (such as providingthe newsletter primarily by e-mail withan option to receive a mailed copy bypaying more dues.The need for having more membersvolunteer to help with the work neededto keep SEMCO going was repeatedlyaddressed. Mr. Callow displayed a listof positions for which volunteers wereneeded, including presentations (eitherhelping to find outside speakers orpreparing and presenting presentations),refreshments coordinator, websiteeditor, publicity chairman, Internet sitecoordinator (Facebook, Meetup, etc.)and more Board members. However,with the exception of one member whosaid he would discuss with Bob Clynewhat was involved in editing the DATABUS, no one offered to be a volunteerduring the meeting.It was decided that the discussionwould continue at the October meetingin the place of a SIG-Techniquesmeeting and the meeting was adjourned.Free Utilities toBoot and Repair“Crashed” PCsBy Ira Wilsker4One day last week I received a phonecall from a prominent media personalityasking for help; his Windows 7 computerwould not fully boot into either normalWindows mode or safe mode. Duringthe boot process it would eitherspontaneously reboot before the desktoploaded, or would start to boot whenthe infamous “Blue Screen of Death”flashed on for just a second or two, andthen the computer would self-reboot,and fail again.I went to his house and foundthat he had a custom built Windows7-64 “Professional” machine thatwas assembled for him by a majorlocal computer store. The machinewas about three years old, and hadbeen problem‑free until this incidentoccurred. My first step in trying to gethis computer to boot was to carefullyobserve his boot process, trying to readthe error codes on the “Blue Screen”before they flashed off. After severalreboots, I noticed that the error codeswere inconsistent, as they were differentwith each reboot.After several unsuccessful attemptsto boot into safe mode, trying safe modeby itself, safe mode with networking,and safe mode command prompt,I finally was able to boot once intoregular safe mode. I asked him if he hadinstalled any new software or hardwarerecently prior to this problem, and hesaid no. I went to System Restore andfound a restore point from a few daysprior to this boot problem, checked theutility to see if any files were in jeopardy(none were), and ran the system restore.

The process appeared to completesuccessfully, and rebooted the computer,but the problem continued; it was in an“infinite loop” of boot–reboot.I tried several times again toboot into safe mode (F8), with onlytemporary success. I tried to checkhis startup using MSCONFIG, but thecomputer often self-booted too quicklyto accomplish the task; after about thefifth attempt, I was able to uncheckeverything unnecessary and save therevised startup settings just before thecomputer rebooted itself again. Fullyaware that if it was a malware problemthat had impacted his startup process,the malware might not show up inthe startup listing. I inquired as to thesecurity system that he had installedon the computer; he replied with thename of a major, very popular, freewareantivirus product. I inquired if it wasjust the antivirus utility or the entiresecurity suite, and he informed methat it was just the antivirus product.Now I became even more suspiciousof the cause of his boot problem, asviruses are now only a small minorityof contemporary malware threats, andtraditional antivirus software, evenwhen frequently updated, may notprovide any protection from the myriadof threats being widely circulated.I proceeded to boot his computerusing a bootable CD that I had with meso I could backup his critical personalfiles to his external USB hard driveusing the included backup utility, andthen run several repair utilities thathave worked well in the past to bootpreviously unbootable computers. Thebootable CD that I had with me was awell regarded commercial product (notfreeware) that had been recently sentto me for review and testing. Despite5running each of the included utilities,followed by an on-screen confirmationthat they appeared to be successfulmaking changes to his hard drive andcritical system files, his computer stillwould not successfully reboot. Stymied,I offered to return with some additionalutilities.There are some excellent freewareutilities that can be used to createbootable CDs (and in some casesbootable USB drives), and contain awide variety of repair and recoveryutilities. Since they are frequentlyupdated, I chose to download andcreate fresh CDs of each, rather thanuse the older CDs that I alreadyhad. While most of the computersecurity software publishers, such asTrendMicro (TrendMicro Rescue Disk)and Kaspersky (Kaspersky Rescue Disk10), offer a free downloadable utilityto create a bootable CD that can detectand clean a malware infected computer,a process that is often adequate toenable a heavily infected computerto successfully reboot, my personalpreference is for a bootable CD thatcan scan for malware as well as offeradditional repair utilities that may beuseful in repairing damage caused bymalware or other issues. My preferenceis to create bootable CDs rather thanbootable USB drives because virtuallyany CD drive-equipped PC can bebooted with a CD, but only some ofthe newer PCs support booting from aUSB drive.While I commonly create four orfive different bootable CDs in orderto deal with almost any reasonablecontingency, there are two that aremy primary “go to” CDs. In the eventthat there might be a malware probleminfluencing a boot problem, my