So you just got a new computer for Christmas. Now what?

(Note this was written 12/31/2008 and has been updated with Microsoft Security Essentials Link on 10/1/2009)

With the economy the way it is the price of the personal computer has reduced so drastically that many people are finally able to own one. I am writing this article for the first timer who just got a new computer this Christmas as a guide to places you can go to get help and point out some free utilities that will make your life easier.

First of all of course I am assuming since you are reading this that you have figured out how to get your computer hooked up to the internet. This was probably accomplished by the ATT, Time Warner, Wowway, Directv, AOL, Geek Squad or whatever guy coming to your house, plugging in a box, running a utility on your computer, handing you a sheet of paper and Saying, Yup, you're all hooked up Maam, I gotta go call in..y'all have a nice day. You are left holding a stack of papers and trying to sort through the ugliness of it all.

If you just plugged your computer into the internet the FIRST and MOST IMPORTANT thing you want to do is Update, Update, Update. Assuming your computer is running some version of Windows be it Windows XP or Windows Vista you need to go out to the Microsoft Windows Update site BEFORE YOU GO ON ANY OTHER WEBSITE! To get to the windows update site open your Internet Explorer browser and click on the Tools Menu at the top and choose Windows Update from the drop down. One of two things will happen depending on what version of Windows you are running. If you are running Windows XP a new screen will popup and you may get a prompt asking to run ActiveX controls. Click OK. You may need to right click on a bar across the top of the screen and choose Allow active X control. Then you should click on the Grey Express button to start searching for updates. Once all updates are found Microsoft will give you a list of them. Click on the Install now link to install all of them. Wait until they are done installing. Click on Reboot if you are prompted to.

When the computer comes back up. Repeat the above procedure Over and Over and Over again until there are no critical updates left. DO NOT GO ON ANY OTHER WEBSITES UNTIL YOU HAVE DONE THIS! If it is Windows Vista you are using another Window will pop up with a yellow box you need to click on to search for updates. Search for updates, allow Windows to install them, reboot if necessary, repeat, until it tells you there are no more updates. If you do not do anything else in this article to your PC this is the THE most important piece of inforamation you should take away from it.

Now your PC is updated and protected for the most part but you are still not ready to go off into the annals of the World Wild Web. If you did not have Microsoft Office and want to install that install it now. Put the disk in, follow the prompts, install it. If you are Windows XP go to http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/downloads/FX101859091033.aspx otherwise if you are Vista go back to the Microsoft Update site and keep updating until there are no more. Lather, rinse, repeat. Install any other Microsoft software repeat.

Antivirus is next. Some computers come with Antivirus preinstalled or a trial version installed.

Whatever it is unless it is Microsoft Security Essentials, Mcafee or Trend, go to your control panel from your start menu and choose programs (or add remove programs on XP) and uninstall it and then go back to Best Buy or whatever computer store you bought it from and demand a discount on one of those packages because you just paid $500 for a computer from them and the AV software they installed is for the most part crap. There are free antivirus programs out there and I have written about them, but it is worth $30 to protect your investment and your time is worth more than that. Spend a weekend(weeks maybe even) without a PC while someone cleans off a virus for you and you will know what I mean. Symantec/ Norton Antivirus is just an OK product compared to Trend or Mcafee. Just trust me on it. One of my first jobs in IT over 25 years ago was as a Virus Technician at NASA Glenn (former Lewis) Space center. I've followed these products and know what is and isn't going to be useful.

Now install the Antivirus of your choice. Go into the program and run the update feature. Keep running it until there are no more updates. Lather, rinse, repeat.

NOTE: Since I wrote this, Microsoft Onecare has been Released as a FREE product called Windows Security Essentials. I highly reccomend you install this product which can be donloaded from: http://www.microsoft.com/SECURITY_ESSENTIALS/
Further Trend makes a web browser add on to keep you safe while you are surfing at:
http://free.antivirus.com/web-protection-add-on/ which should also be installed on all of your systems.

Now your experience on the web is useless unless you have 3 utilities installed on your computer and they are now owned by Adobe. They are Acrobat Reader, Shockwave, and Flash. The 4th program you'll need is Sun's Java. You may as well do these first.

Lets start with Shockwave first. Go out to the Adobe website at http://get.adobe.com/shockwave/ Click on the Yellow button that reads "Agree and Install now" If you are running Vista you may have to click OK on a User Access Control prompt

Uncheck the box to include Norton Security scan in the popup if you get it and click on Next, you may get a yellow bar across the top of your browser that you have to right click your mouse on to allow the installation. If all goes right shockwave will finish installing and you will be done.

Next lets install Adobe Flash. A LOT of websites require Flash. Head on over to http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/ Click to uncheck the box in front of "Free Google Toolbar" (you don't need it) and then click on the yellow Agree and install now button. You may have to click inside the box on the next screen on the Green Shield and choose Install ActiveX and then continue or Allow on the Windows Vista User Access Control prompt. Then Click Install in the next popup window. Flash should then be installed and you are done.


Adobe Acrobat Reader for PDF's at http://get.adobe.com/reader/ is installed in much the same way as the Flash Player. Be sure to click to UNCHECK the box in front of Free Google Toolbar and then click on the download button. Right click on the yellow bar across the top of your Internet Explorer browser window and choose Install Activex control from the drop down. If you have Vista as your Operating system click Continue on the User access control prompt that comes up. Next click on the Install button in the popup window. Follow the prompts to finish Adobe Reader installation. Note that there are other free versions of PDF readers like Foxit but Adobe is the industry standard.

Finally you will need Java installed. Go out to http://java.com/en/download/index.jsp
and click on the blue button that reads "Java Download" , if you are Vista, click Continue in the User access control popup you get, allow any other firewall prompts you may get. Then click on Install in the popup. The java installer will download java. Accept the license agreement by clicking on the accept button. Then click on Finish when it is done. Watch for check boxes along the way prompting to install MSN or Google Toolbar and uncheck those boxes if they come up.

Now you are ready to enjoy and surf the web. Try out your new installs over on my Stressedpuppy games Site at http://www.stressedpuppy.com/ it makes use of many of the plugins we just installed! Happy computing!

Here is an additional tip from Microsoft on what to do before you connect your computer to the internet: http://www.microsoft.com/protect/computer/advanced/xppc.mspx

Microsoft Releases Free Antivirus Solution

Today Microsoft Corporation Released Windows Security Essentials. A free solution for Genuine users of Microsoft Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 operating system.

The product is lightweight, fast and will be updated by windows updates. The product is a stripped down version of the paid Windows Live Onecare product that Microsoft announced it would be discontinuing. The backup, multicomputer and firewall features have been removed from the Onecare product to make up Security Essentials.

Still a very compelling download if you are using some other free third part antivirus software.

You can download and get Windows Security Essentialst at:

http://www.microsoft.com/SECURITY_ESSENTIALS/

Note for those of you who use Grisoft AVG it installed right along side my AVG on my Windows 7 Installation without issue. Pretty cool. Trend Micro has yet to release a Windows 7 client for their SMB client suite so I can't say if it plays well.

Windows 7 Remote Administrator Tools available

Microsoft has released the RTM version of the Windows 7 remote administrator tools which includes admx templates and updated versions of Remote Desktops and AD Users.

You can download it from:


http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=7d2f6ad7-656b-4313-a005-4e344e43997d

Note that even though the 64 bit version appears to be labeled AMD it should work on any processor.

After you install the MSU file you will have to go to the Control Panel, Programs applet and choose "Turn Windows Features On or Off" and select the administrative tools you want added and allow them to be installed.

Listing of SBC Communities / New Xenapp CTO

Rich Crusco of Citrix has compiled an excellent very inclusive list of some of the best Citrix Community Websites. It brings back memories of Thethin.net and some of the links it had to offer. Great Job Rich!

You can check out the links page at:

http://community.citrix.com/display/cdn/Community+Featured

In other Citrix News Harry Labana has joined Citrix as VP and CTO of the XenApp product group. Harry is from Goldman Sachs where he was Vice President leading global efforts for Desktop and Application virtualization. I am certain he will be a great asset to the team.

Citrix Provisioning Server (PVS) 5.1 Released to MyCitrix.com

Today Citrix released its latest version of Provisioning Server release 5.1.
You can download the file from your http://www.mycitrix.com/ account.

PVS 5.1 download is the same for both Citrix Provisioning Server for Data Center and Citrix Provisioning Server for Desktops. SO Whats new and is it worth the upgrade?

Here is the Chart of what is new

(Click on the image to read the text)



Basically the new features are:

-Standard Image NIC Teaming - Enables teaming of NICs on provisioned systems using Intel or Broadcom nic teaming

-Offline vDisk Maintenance - Provides the ability to boot Provisiong Server VHD images within Xenserver OR Hyper-V for offline maintenance w/o requiring access ti a streamed device.

-User Assigned vDisks - selects the vDisk to stream to a provisioned system based on user logon

-Offline database Support - Allows continued operation of provisioned server hosts and provisioned systems in the event of a database failure.

- Server Maintenance Mode - Provides a mechanism to place a provisioned server host into "maintenance mode" automatically moving streamed sessions to other hosts in the farm.

- Multiple partition vDisks - Enables imaging systems with multiple disks into a single vDisk

- Read Only vDisk storage - Improves system performance by allowing VHD's to be deployed on read only volumes, reducing disk I/O

- Auditing and enhanced logging - Provides enhanced ability to monitor system and administrator activity.

- XP Embedded Streaming (YAY!!!) - Provides the ability to build and stream XP Embedded
images used by thin client machines.

There you have it! Go give it a try!

Congratulations to Citrix 20th Anniversary!

Today Citrix Systems celebrates their 20th anniversy. We have been using Citrix at Cuyahoga County Public Library where I work for 13 years since 1996!

Our saga with Citrix started with our need to get graphical internet working in our 28 branches that serve over 6 million patrons. At the time we had hundreds of VT 100 terminals running our library catalog and access to the internet via a Lynx nongraphical browser. We had about 6 Windows 3.11 workstations dispursed throughout the branches that ran CD rom programs like encyclopedia britannica and Stock reports. We wanted a way to easily manage and get our patrons Graphical Internet using Mozilla. (It wasn't called Firefox back then) Our Vendor brought in a Wyse Winterminal connected to a server running Windows NT 3.51 along with something called Citrix Winframe and showed us how we could possible use it for our problem. We eventually bought one server for testing and proved it could work. And purchased Computers for our staff and 500 Wyse Winterminals for our patrons. We were the first public library to offer Graphical Internet in the United States thanks to Citrix. I learned I could publish the CDROM content over Citrix to ALL of our branches via Citrix and we were able to eliminate all the local servers at the few branches we had them at.

We proceded through the years to get the next version of Citrix - Metaframe, Presentation Server, Xenserver and now use Citrix for our Staff to use Office 2007 applications.

We are testing Citrix Provisioning Server to publish desktops out to our patrons to assist with our ever increasing computer management headaches.

The library and myself have participated in many case studies for Citrix over the years, I've beta tested as many of their products, and spent countless hours supporting their products.

Citrix has matured into an outstanding corporation and has evolved with the industry to the point where they are now a market leader in most everything they do. With everything I have seen over the last 13 years I am really excited to see what the next 20 years will bring. Congratulations Citrix!

Here is my Video Congratulations submission:

Conficker Worm Warning No April Fools Joke

Various news outlets and antivirus vendors are warning against a malicious worm that will trigger on April 1st of this year called the Conficker. It is considered a troublesome worm that will render your PC over to the hacker who will have the ability to control it as if he were sitting right in front of it.(Yahoo sample article here: http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/null/128643/beware-conficker-worm-come-april-1/ )

While this is a real threat, particularly ominous warning (and a lot of sensationalism in my opinion) the fact of the matter is, if you have up to date antivirus software, are careful about what you download and have been diligent about performing Windows updates on your home computer you probably need not be concerned about this virus.

There are many ways that you can get a worm or virus on your computer but the latest scheme involves a spoofed email that appears to come from your Internet Service Provider (ATT, Comcast, etc) and instructs you to click on a link to download"important service updates" to your computer. When you click on the link it takes you to a realistic looking(albeit fake or spoofed) web site from your provider and an immediate download box appears on the screen. If you click OK to install it, the worm is installed and your computer is now owned by the hacker. (Pwned in hacker slang) This is also known as a drive by download.

Notice that it takes action by the user in order for this to happen. So it is always important to question WHY, if you are ever asked to download a file and verify the website you are on before you do so for maximum protection

You can check your home Computer with FREE tools available from Trend or Microsoft. Most of these tools will require that you allow an ActiveX control be run on your computer in order to run. You can trust content from the Microsoft.com, Live.com and TrendMicro.com web sites, just verify you are on the correct link.

Microsoft has Live Scan you can use to scan your Computer Online at:http://onecare.live.com/site/en-us/default.htm
Just click on the Full Service Scan and follow the directions and Microsoft will test your computer to verify there is no malware installed.

Microsoft offers a plethora of information on how to protect your home computer here: http://www.microsoft.com/protect/default.mspx

TrendMicro has provided many useful FREE utilities also that can be used on your computer.

Housecall is very useful and will scan your entire computer Online for malicious thingshttp://us.trendmicro.com/us/products/personal/free-tools-and-services/index.html

Click on the Housecall link and then click on the launch Housecall Free scan button and follow the instructions

Also on the above TrendMicro page is a utility called TrendProtect. This utility is a plug-in for Internet Explorer that will help prevent you from accidently going to a web site that contains Malware or Viruses. Click on the link for it and click on the download button on the next page to install it. Click on the "Install for Internet Explorer" button and choose Run. The install will continue.

There are also several other useful FREE utilities on the TrendMicro link above.

It is inevitable that some nasty bug may someday creep inside your computer but if you follow the above advice it is hopefully more likely that it will be a real fly or mosquito versus a piece of malware software with intent on stealing your data.

Citrix Provisioning Server (PVS) 5.0 Service Pack 2 has been released to web!

Just got the following from Pete Downing at Citrix. PVS 5 SP2 has been released to Web

All,

I am happy to report that Provisioning Server SP2 has officially released to web (RTW) and available for customer download.

The key improvements in this release center around bug fixes and licensing updates. These include:

· ~10 bug fixes, including duplicate SPN generation and other Active Directory compatibility items

· Technology Preview support for Windows 7 Beta

· Licensing changes for Citrix Essentials and XenApp

Provisioning Server 5.0 SP2 is a full product install.

For a complete list of new features, refer to the release notes, or the product software download page (https://www.citrix.com/English/SS/downloads/results.asp?productID=1297541).

To download the release notes, documentation or programming guides, please see the support website (http://support.citrix.com/product/provsvr/psv5.0#tab-doc).

Thanks!

Pete

Pete Downing
Senior Product Manager, Provisioning services
Citrix Systems, Inc.