Hybrid At HARS

Tonight AB Computer Training were visitors at the Illawarra Business Chamber's meeting at the Historical Aircraft Restoration Society Museum at the Illawarra Regional Airport in Albion Park Rail. The meeting was hosted by Toyota, who unveiled their new Hybrid Camry, which is soon to be built here in Australia.

The meeting was well attended, and we took the opportunity to network with other local businesses, whilst admiring both the cars, and teh historic aircraft which provided a backdrop to the event. Needless to say we took a few photos (click on them to see bigger versions):

What's under here?



It's the new Toyota Hybrid Camry:



See under the bonnet:



And a view from behind the wheel:



Catherine got to meet Illawarra St George Dragons player Matt Cooper:



There are other pictures on our Flickr stream.

Oh, and I promised to say hello to Libby Geen of Formula Training Solutions.

ILLAWARRA WOMEN IN BUSINESS AWARDS

ILLAWARRA WOMEN IN BUSINESS had their awards last Friday, 26th March. It was a packed house of some hundred and fifty people and there were four awards ranging from the Best Home Based Business to Young Business Woman of the Year.
A great networking event with business cards and literature being handed out by one and all. Some inspirational speakers and a good time was had by all. AB Computer Training were there as first-timers but I've no doubt that it will be an event we will be eagerly following, if not participating in, in future years.

ADA LOVELACE DAY 2010

WOMEN IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Everyone probably knows a woman in science and technology. It could be your GP, a teacher or your local pharmacist; however, the term does tend to conjur up visions of the likes of Madame Curie.

Today I would like to aknowledge the expertise and dedication of a scientist with whom I had a close association for a number of years - Barbara Taylor BVSc MRCVS. A Bachelor of Veterinary Science and a Member of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons,her training must have taken at least five years to complete, but it is the compassion and empathy that she shows towards her patients and their owners that is a quality that is somehow lacking in the commonly held view of "scientists". Perhaps this is why one can probably reel off the names of a dozen or more male scientists but find it harder to think of females in the same role.

(Ada Lovelace Day is an international day of blogging which celebrates women in science and technology. For more details, and to pledge your post, visit the Finding Ada website.)

Parking In Wollongong

According to the Illawarra Mercury, it appears that the new parking meters in Wollongong's CBD are getting off to a slow start:

Shopper Shun Meters

In terms of clients we have little to do with central Wollongong, so this would not seem to be an issue for us at first glance. However, like any business, we do have odd jobs we need to do at banks and various stores there, so we do make short trips into the centre. Certainly knowing that timed spaces are not now occupied by people using them all day is going to be a plus; but really it's only the two hour spaces that are any use to us; for a one hour trip the car-park for Crown St. Mall offers better value. To be honest there's still a lot to be said for parking a little further down Kenny or Keira St if you can find a space; five minutes walk gets you into the centre, and the on-street is untimed and free. Certainly worth considering if you want an extended trip to the centre.

What is interesting is the comments that some of the pay stations are already not working. This is only the first week of operation. Are they untested, or just prone to breakdown?

Helpful Tips #2 - Passwords

How secure are your passwords? If the answer is ‘not very’ then you could be leaving yourself open to risk from identity theft and fraud.

The problem is that short, simple password are, whilst easy to remember, open to attack by hackers using simple brute-force approaches to ‘guess’ password. And once a password is guessed, your accounts are open to theft and exploitation.

So what makes a password simple? Using consecutive keys on the keyboard is one example – the password ‘123456’, whilst easy to remember, is also easy to guess. The same is true for ‘qwerty’ (the first six letter keys on a standard keyboard. Indeed, passwords which make use of consecutive strings of characters are all equally insecure – ‘abcdef’ may not be a password made of keys which are next to each other on the keyboard, but it’s still an easily guessed combination.

As well as consecutive characters, using slang words, trivial phrases or words which can be found in the dictionary all have risks. Using the same password on multiple websites is also a risk.

A recent study revealed the ten commonest passwords currently in use worldwide:

123456

12345
123456789
Password
iloveyou
princess
rockyou
1234567
12345678
abc123

So how do you make sure that your passwords are secure?

• Firstly, avoid passwords on the above list. In addition, avoid choosing passwords which make use of information which fraudsters can easily obtain about you – your date of birth, home address or even your mother’s maiden name.
  
  
• Use different passwords on different accounts wherever possible.
  
  
• Avoid using single words which are found in the dictionary (for example ‘princess’ in the above list). Some automated attacks simply crack passwords by running through lists of words from the dictionary. If you do use a dictionary word, use a long one.
  
  
• It's a good idea not to allow your computer to remember your passwords. Even if no one else uses your computer, if it is stolen the thieves will be able to access your private information and even hijack your identity.
  
  
• Mix up letters and numbers, and use the Shift key. Most systems use ‘case sensitive’ passwords, which means that they treat capital letters differently from small letters. Thus ‘ABCDEF’, ’abcdef’ and ‘AbCdEf’ are considered to be three different passwords. Some systems allow the use of characters other than letters or numbers – ‘&’, ‘%’, ‘?’, for example.
  
  
• Make sure that your password is as long as possible; one more than eight characters long is good.
  
  
• Change your passwords regularly. Once a month is ideal, but even every six months is better than never.
  
  
• Use different user names and passwords on different accounts.

Phrases make good passwords – a line from a favourite poem, song or rhyme. If you just use the first letter of each word in the phrase, then that is even better; ‘Once a jolly swagman camped beside a billabong’ is an easily remembered phrase, and gives the password ‘Oajscbab’. Easy for you to remember, but hard for someone to guess. And note the use of the upper-case ‘O’ at the beginning.

Microsoft offers a password checker tool which can be used to check how secure they are.

Following these simple tips can protect you and your family from fraud and identity theft. And they’re all easy to implement.

Danger: Virus Targets Facebook Users

Whilst I'm sure that you are all well aware of the dangers of spam mails telling you to click on attachments, if you are a facebook user it's worth being aware of this:

Facebook Password-Stealing Virus

On the subject of Facebook, the Daily Mail in the UK have got themselves into trouble over an article they published linking it to paedophile activity:

Facebook Threatens To Sue 'Daily Mail'.

Wings Over Illawarra

Last month we attended the Wings Over Illawarra open-day at the Illawara regional Airport in Albion Park Rail. Like many others we were stuck in a long queue of traffic to get there; worse in our case as we wanted to go somewhere else first, so had to sit in a queue to get past the airport, then queue up coming the other way to get into the show. There was also a fair wait to get out of the event once you left the car park.

Anyway, the RTA and the police have raised concerns about the volume of traffic. Not sure what they can really do about it, though; the Princes Highway through Albion Park Rail has always been a bottle-neck, and will be until the deviation round the back of Albion Park itself is built. Our work with AB Computer Training means that we spend a lot of time on the road; if we make a trip through Albion Park Rail we have to allow for extra journey time because you can never tell how badly clogged up it's going to be.

The part about the distinction between an 'open day' and an 'air show' is interesting as well. Pedantic, but of importance to the organisers, I guess.

Helpful Tips #1 - Dismounting Memory Devices

USB memory sticks/flash drives, wireless internet dongles, some cameras, MP3 players and certain other devices need to be properly dismounted from your computer. You should not just unplug them, as doing so can possibly corrupt the device and even data on your computer.

To dismount your device:
1. Click on the Unplug or Eject Hardware icon in the taskbar’s tool tray – this is the icon with the green arrow
2. Click 'Safely remove USB Mass Storage Device'. There may be more than one entry here if you have several devices connected to your computer. Usually you can tell which device is which by the name.
3. Once you click on 'Safely Remove USB Mass Storage Device' a notification balloon should appear to let you know it has dismounted correctly. Close it and unplug the drive.

If the drive will not dismount it may be because it is still in use on your computer. Check that any documents or files on the drive are not open in an application (for example, a document may still be open in Word, or an image in Photoshop). Check that there is not an explorer window open for one of the folders on the drive. In all of these cases close down the window, and try dismounting it again.

Sometimes even this is not sufficient. In this case you will need to log out of Windows, and then disconnect the device.

It is always safe to unplug a device whilst the machine is shut down.

Was this information helpful to you? Let us know - leave a comment below, or drop us an e-mail.

Go Hawks!

The Wollongong Hawks are now one game away from the NBL title - tomorrow night in Perth they play their third game against the Wildcats.

Update: Why not combine watching the game with a evening out? Go and see it at West's Leagues Club, in Unanderra. Indeed, if you see us there we can discuss your computer training needs as well.

Are Year 9 Laptops Useless?

This story in today's Illawarra Mercury is interesting.

Are the laptops rolled out to Year 9 students in NSW of no real use? Any laptop is obviously better than none, but if it's not possible to install useful software or peripherals on them, then just how much use are they? Access to websites is a tricky thing, of course. Take a site like the photo-hosting site Flickr. As a source of useful pictures for school projects its benefits cannot be denied. But there's also images there that are unsuitable even for your average Year 9 student. How do you allow acces to one but block the other? Or do you just block the site altogether?

It's a tricky problem. What do you think?

MARCH NEWSLETTER

MARCH NEWSLETTER - Now available on our website at www.abcomputertraining.com. It contains lots of useful information on setting up a network and articles on initiatives encouraging seniors to get connected and even the Pony Express. Take a look!

Congratulations!

Congratulations to the Wollongong Hawks, who won their ABL semi-final against Townsville, and now face Perth in the final. An amazing comeback for a team which, last year, looked set to disappear forever.

Wings Over Illawarra

We had a great day at the Wings Over Illawarra airshow yesterday. Organised by the Historical Aircraft Restoration Society, this event showcases various historical and contemorary aircraft, with static displays, and spectacular exhibitions of flying. Top attractions were the restored Constellation airliner, the RAAF Roulettes, and an amazing display of aerobatics in an F18 Hornet.

Here are a few of the pictures we took: