Sunday, December 27, 2009
Turn off Javascript in Adobe Acrobat and leave it off
Adobe Acrobat Reader has been plagued countless times throughout this entire decade with malware vulnerabilities arising from programming errors related to its built-in JavasScript interpreter.
As usual, Adobe has instructed users to go into the Preferences for Acrobat and disable the JavaScript interpreter.
I recommend doing that, and also I recommend uninstalling the Acrobat Reader plugin. Looking at PDF files in a web page with Acrobat is too dangerous. This JavaScript problem keeps hitting it. Adobe needs to provide a permanent solution - not a perpetual problem.
Macintosh computers come with the Preview application, which was written by Apple. Macs also have an OS that actually understands PDF really well. The Mac Preview application will not execute JavaScript that is in PDF files. So it is the way to go if you have a Mac. It is bad, actually, to install Acrobat Reader on a Mac. No good will come from it.
For MS Windows computers, just deactivate JavaScript in Adobe Acrobat Reader, and uninstall its plugin. That will make an incredibly huge improvement in the safety of your Windows PC. Keep it that way.
As usual, Adobe has instructed users to go into the Preferences for Acrobat and disable the JavaScript interpreter.
I recommend doing that, and also I recommend uninstalling the Acrobat Reader plugin. Looking at PDF files in a web page with Acrobat is too dangerous. This JavaScript problem keeps hitting it. Adobe needs to provide a permanent solution - not a perpetual problem.
Macintosh computers come with the Preview application, which was written by Apple. Macs also have an OS that actually understands PDF really well. The Mac Preview application will not execute JavaScript that is in PDF files. So it is the way to go if you have a Mac. It is bad, actually, to install Acrobat Reader on a Mac. No good will come from it.
For MS Windows computers, just deactivate JavaScript in Adobe Acrobat Reader, and uninstall its plugin. That will make an incredibly huge improvement in the safety of your Windows PC. Keep it that way.
Labels: web
Thinking about Thunderbird?
This month a new version of the Mozilla Thunderbird email client was released. Thunderbird is the email counterpart of the web browser. They share a lot of the same technology.
MS Windows users disturbed by Internet Explorer and Outlook problems can get a nice boost in terms of standards support and computer safety by installing Thunderbird and using it as their email client.
Outlook has a very troubling history. Thunderbird is worth looking into. The latest version has some very nice, fresh, new features.
MS Windows users disturbed by Internet Explorer and Outlook problems can get a nice boost in terms of standards support and computer safety by installing Thunderbird and using it as their email client.
Outlook has a very troubling history. Thunderbird is worth looking into. The latest version has some very nice, fresh, new features.
Labels: email, opensource
Firefox 3.5 the most popular of any version of any brand of web browser
The ultra-popular Mozilla Firefox 3.5, the latest released version of Firefox is the most popular of any particular version of any web browser for any brand.
The first popular web browser, Mosaic, was created by programmers at NCSA, located at UIUC - a university in the US. That was back around 1993.
They were subsequently lured away to create a new web browser, Netscape, at a new start-up company by that name in California. Netscape was wildly successful, and then in the late 1990's, suddenly lost marketshare to the Microsoft Internet Explorer web browser. Ironically, Microsoft did not write IE, they bought Mosaic from the University, which had spun it off and renamed it Spyglass.
Netscape responded by founding a non-profit organization, Mozilla, and set about creating the Mozilla web browser under its auspices. The Mozilla browser was very popular but never came close to recapturing all of Netscape's former market share.
However, a sleeker, faster, more powerful web browser was created from Mozilla. This new one was called Firefox.
Now, Firefox is one of the most advanced, standards-compliant web browsers around. Internet Explorer, in classic tortoise-hare fashion, is one of the least.
And correspondingly, it is now Firefox that has the most popular web browser version around.
The first popular web browser, Mosaic, was created by programmers at NCSA, located at UIUC - a university in the US. That was back around 1993.
They were subsequently lured away to create a new web browser, Netscape, at a new start-up company by that name in California. Netscape was wildly successful, and then in the late 1990's, suddenly lost marketshare to the Microsoft Internet Explorer web browser. Ironically, Microsoft did not write IE, they bought Mosaic from the University, which had spun it off and renamed it Spyglass.
Netscape responded by founding a non-profit organization, Mozilla, and set about creating the Mozilla web browser under its auspices. The Mozilla browser was very popular but never came close to recapturing all of Netscape's former market share.
However, a sleeker, faster, more powerful web browser was created from Mozilla. This new one was called Firefox.
Now, Firefox is one of the most advanced, standards-compliant web browsers around. Internet Explorer, in classic tortoise-hare fashion, is one of the least.
And correspondingly, it is now Firefox that has the most popular web browser version around.
Labels: firefox, statistics
Update to Firefox 3.5.6!
There are issues fixed by updating to Firefox 3.5.6. It is very important at this time to keep Firefox up to date.
That goes for the Firefox application program itself, the extensions you have installed, and the plugins.
Unfortunately, Firefox lacks a built-in, automated way to check for out-of-date plugins and offer to update them for you.
However, there is at least a web page at the Mozilla web site that will do that for you. Using Firefox web browser, click the shiny bit of blog bling in the lower left corner of my weblog page here, so you can get that done.
That simply takes you to their web page. Their page does all the work. Just read it carefully. Make sure you bookmark their page, by the way. You will want to visit that web page regularly. I recommend doing it about once a week.
Updating Ad-ons in Firefox is easy. Just go to the Tools menu in Firefox, Choose Add-ons menu item, and click the Find Updates button at the bottom of the dialog box that appears. It will let you know if there are any updates that need to be applied and then display a Restart button if there are.
To update Firefox itself, you should go to its Help menu and choose the Check for Updates menu item.
If software developers at Mozilla update Firefox, but you never get those updates from them - then your computer just gets more and more at risk. Plus, you are not going to get improvements. The same goes for updating its third-party plugins and add-ons.
That goes for the Firefox application program itself, the extensions you have installed, and the plugins.
Unfortunately, Firefox lacks a built-in, automated way to check for out-of-date plugins and offer to update them for you.
However, there is at least a web page at the Mozilla web site that will do that for you. Using Firefox web browser, click the shiny bit of blog bling in the lower left corner of my weblog page here, so you can get that done.
That simply takes you to their web page. Their page does all the work. Just read it carefully. Make sure you bookmark their page, by the way. You will want to visit that web page regularly. I recommend doing it about once a week.
Updating Ad-ons in Firefox is easy. Just go to the Tools menu in Firefox, Choose Add-ons menu item, and click the Find Updates button at the bottom of the dialog box that appears. It will let you know if there are any updates that need to be applied and then display a Restart button if there are.
To update Firefox itself, you should go to its Help menu and choose the Check for Updates menu item.
If software developers at Mozilla update Firefox, but you never get those updates from them - then your computer just gets more and more at risk. Plus, you are not going to get improvements. The same goes for updating its third-party plugins and add-ons.
Labels: browsing, firefox, software, update, web
At least you can make Firefox safe: update plugins!
Firefox has a pretty cool web page. It came out this autumn and it tells you if Firefox has any out of date plugins. Plugins can do anything. Since flaws are constantly being discovered in plugins for every web browser, and updates keep coming out for them - you need to know when that happens and take measures to update them.
Firefox plugin check
Tell your Firefox-using friends about the page that points to so they can be safer too.
Hopefully, this feature will get built into the web browser in the future. It seems awkward to be passing around a crucial feature by its URL.
Firefox plugin check
Tell your Firefox-using friends about the page that points to so they can be safer too.
Hopefully, this feature will get built into the web browser in the future. It seems awkward to be passing around a crucial feature by its URL.
Labels: Firefox 3, software, update
Hopefully, someday I will get this page to validate!
