The World Wide Web turned 25 last week so to celebrate we’ve picked out some of its milestones and some things to remember.

 Launch

On 6^th August 1991, Tim Berners-Lee launched the first ever website but it was on March 12 1989 when he first wrote the proposal for it, describing an information management system. He shows it to his boss at CERN who described it as ‘vague, but exciting.’ The following year, along with Belgian computer scientist Robert Cailliau, Berners-Lee wrote a proposal for a ‘web’ of ‘hypertext documents accessible by ‘browsers’. Berners-Lee created the World Wide Web on a NeXT Computer – the company founded by Steve Jobs when he left Apple in the late eighties.

 

Buying Stuff

In 1994, things started to get commercial. Online banking popped up, as did Pizza Hut’s online ordering system, then came Amazon and eBay in 1995. Today, online shopping is huge. In 2012, there were 242 million people shopping online in China and in 2015, the US online retail industry is expected to be worth $279 billion.

  

Searching Stuff

Google was founded in 1998 in California by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were PhD students at Stanford University. Search engines were already around, but the Googlers invented a different system to how pages were found. They invented Pagerank, which looks at relevance, not just the number of keywords on a web page. In fact they tried to sell Google in 1999 because they felt it was taking too much time away from their studies. They offered Excite CEO George Bell the opportunity to buy the company for $1 million but he rejected the offer. Today, Google’s total assets amount to $110 billion and it pulled in $59 billion in revenue in 2013.  It has over a billion unique visitors every month.

  

Social Stuff

Facebook may be the biggest social networking site in the world today but it was certainly not the first. The first of the social networking sites as we know them today popped up in 1997 and lasted until 2001. It was called SixDegrees.com and users could list friends, send messages and post bulletin board items to people in their first, second and third degree lists. Eventually it was overtaken by more popular sites such as Friendster, MySpace and Bebo. Facebook was launched in 2004 as a Harvard-only social network.

 Crime stuff

Unfortunately, one of the few bad things about the web is the storing of people’s personal information, hacking and cyber-attacks, fraud and other crimes. Websites that require or store personal information such as payment details, bank records or phone records all need to be secure, but sometimes secure isn’t enough. The web has allowed for a different platform for criminals to commit crimes.

 Changing Stuff

One of the greatest achievements of the Web is the ability for large amounts of people to come together in support of something. Change.org is a website that allows anybody to sign a petition and support change. In 2010, a revolutionary wave of demonstrations and protests emerged all over the Middle East and North Africa and helped to overthrow four different governments including President Muburak in Egypt and Libyan leader Gaddafi. Nine out of ten Tunisians responding to a poll, said they used Facebook to organise protests and spread awareness. The use of social networking sites was a major tool for people coming together quickly in numbers to make change.

  

Annoying Stuff

The World Wide Web has changed the world but it wasn’t always as big, as fast or as easy to access. There are some things that only those old enough will have the pleasure of remembering:

the awful dial-up tone, external modems, disconnecting the phone to use the internet, paying by the minute, chat rooms and a/s/l, very slow loading times, images loading line by line, MSN Messenger, Ask Jeeves and the huge box computers we used to access it all on. Those were the days.

Top Tips For Making Your Phone Battery Last Longer

If you’re anything like us your phone is usually more loyal than your shadow. We check it first thing when we wake, read the news, glance through our emails. Then we head to work, drowning out the familiar public transport sounds with music or podcasts, maybe sending a text or two between tunnels. For the next eight hours its texts, emails and calls, until it’s time to finish when we go to plug our headphones in and… oh… dead battery.

The current generation of mobile phones are improving, but in 2013 your little appy friend is going to need a top up in the middle of the day, else it’s awkwardly avoiding commuter eye contact and the repetitive drone of “Mind the gap” in 30 degree heat all the way home. There’s not much to solve that until all phones pack a battery like the Motorla Razr HD (which can almost survive a 12-hour day), but that doesn’t mean there aren’t things you can do to help get the most out of your smartphone.

1) Dim the screen – Your brand new 6-inch, billion pixel screen may let you read the BBC in eye-blistering colour and beauty, but it’s almost certainly the reason that you have to keep a charger nearby at all times. Sift through your display settings for a way to turn it down. If there’s an auto-brightness option it’s worth trialling for a while, but some people find that it actually drains even more battery. Though not much can help you if the sun is relentlessly beating down on your screen.
 
2) Turn off Bluetooth and WiFi – these two wireless technologies are fantastic for making the most out of Starbucks’ free internet whilst chatting away and slurping a drink. But when you’re not using them they’re just melting your battery away faster than your Mocha Frappuccino in July. Most phones have a quick toggle option, so switch those two off when you don’t need them.

3) Ditch the sensors – let’s take as an example the Samsung Galaxy S4, but this goes to some degree to all phones. Yes you can raise it to magically dial someone, yes it can automatically scroll down a page by watching your eyeballs, and yes it can sense your body temperature and lower it to that of a cool mist (It can’t? Oh, sorry). But all these sensors constantly monitoring a million environmental factors aren’t being powered by their own impressiveness. Stick to manually scrolling, dialling or whatever, and your phone might last a little longer.

4) Reduce the updates – it’s really tempting with our current level of connectivity to want to be notified the instant someone retweets your company’s latest offer. But do you really need a pop up to tell you it’s currently 2 degrees warmer in London than it was 30 minutes ago? It may not seem like much but every time your phone does that it draws power from all over. If it can wait until you get to your computer, maybe trying letting it?
 

5) Keep it cool – I know, in the middle of summer that sounds a tad ridiculous. But when your phone gets warm it actually drains the battery a lot faster than it otherwise would. So when your phone is stuck in your pocket, jammed against your radiating thigh on a crowded greenhouse of a bus it’s going to die a lot sooner than if it was in your bag. Avoid letting it overheat and it might even make it to tea time.

Phasing Out Windows XP & Server 2003

 

On April 8th 2014 Microsoft will stop supporting Windows XP and Server 2003. For those of you still working with those faithful old operating systems, this may come as a surprise, but from that date, there will be no further updates and no more assistance from Microsoft.

Why?

Software companies can’t continue to support their products forever. At some point keeping decades-old software protected against increasingly smarter hackers, for the tiny proportion of people still using it becomes untenable.
Microsoft guarantee continued support and service for a minimum of 10 years. It may not seem like it (and you might want to sit down for a moment) but Windows XP was launched in 2001.

What Does This Mean?

From the 8th April 2014 Microsoft will issue no more updates to the following operating systems:
1)  Windows XP (for PCs)
2)  Windows Server 2003  (for servers)
3)  Microsoft Office 2003 (Word, PowerPoint, Excel etc.)
That includes security fixes and updates – any new vulnerabilities and security holes that are discovered will not be fixed.
As a result, any machines still running these operating systems will be under serious threat. If you’re not sure what version of Windows your PC is running click here to find out.
If your business is still running computers with Windows XP, servers with Server 2003, or you’re using Office 2003 (Word, PowerPoint, Excel etc.), we highly recommend upgrading, to ensure that you’re up to date and protected from future threats.

What To Do Next?
Don’t panic, we’re here to help!
Migrating to newer operating systems is relatively simple, but can take a while. Whether you want to upgrade to Windows 7 or 8, or you want to move to something completely different, give us a call on 9891011610 and one of our engineers will be happy to have a chat with you. Alternatively send us an email at computerannexe@hotmail.com and we’ll get back to you.

 

What is a Wireless Network?

What is a Wireless Network?

 A wireless network is very similar to the wired network in that all the same pieces are still required, a wireless NIC, Access Point (similar to a wired network Ethernet Switch) and a wireless router. The only thing that's missing is the cables. 

First you will need to determine if your desktop or Laptop PC already has a wireless NIC built in. Again, check your users guide to confirm this. Once your wireless NIC is installed you will need to configure the SSID (service set identifier) on each of the PC's to use the same name. Also, you need to make sure all the wireless NICs are configured to be on the same channel and set levels of encryption if desired. Your wireless access point or router should come with detailed explanation of how to configure the SSID and security features such asaccess lists. Many of today's wireless routers come with the access point functionality built right in

 

Computer Annexe | Computer repair and IT Consultant

Computer Annexe | Computer repair and IT Consultant

How to Protect your Privacy on Social Media

How to Protect your Privacy on Social Media

Notions of privacy in the digital age are permanently up for debate. Some say it’s impossible to maintain privacy when everything is posted on Facebook; others say it’s up to the networks to afford us control over our content. Social networks like Ello have accepted the challenge of finding a new way, one that allows us to share every moment of our lives, but only with select people, and definitely not with advertisers.
Until this is perfected it’s important to understand how to control your privacy online. Let’s take a look at 4 of the big social networks.

Facebook

The social media superpower has come under the most scrutiny regarding its privacy and data policies.

As a result, Facebook has overhauled its privacy settings, making them as simple to control as possible.
The Privacy Check-up lets you control who can see your posts in future, which apps can publish to your timeline, which personal details are publicly viewable, and which are locked down.
This won’t lock down older posts; to do that we’ll need to go a bit futher – click ‘See More Settings’ in the Privacy panel.
Timeline & Tagging Settings allows you to control what other people can and can’t post to your timeline. It’ll also let you manage whether or not people can tag you in things without your permission. There’s a handy feature that lets you see how others view your profile, so you can make sure your selected settings are having the desired effect.
Blocking lets you simply block invitations from specific people, apps, pages and events, affording you a blanket layer of protection against particularly stubborn spammers.
Apps allows you to control what data your apps can access, and importantly, whether or not they can post on your behalf.
For a more in-depth walkthrough of Facebook’s controls, check out Gizmodo’s complete guide.

Twitter

There’s a few privacy features available on Twitter, but the most obvious is whether your Tweets are protected or public. If they’re protected people will need to follow you to see anything, and you’ll need to approve each follower request individually.

The rest of the settings can be found by clicking on your profile photo in the top left and selecting ‘Settings’.
From here you can manage who can tag you in Tweets, whether location data is included, how people can find you (by email or phone number) as well as your options with regards to tailored adverts and promotional content.

LinkedIn

You’ll find LinkedIn’s privacy menu lurking in the top right hand corner of the website, hiding in the dropdown reached by clicking your profile picture.
Here, under Privacy & Settings you’ll find 4 tabs to control your profile: ‘Profile’, ‘Communications’, ‘Groups, Companies & Applications’ and ‘Account’.
Profile includes various privacy settings to control who can see what you post, your activity feed, your connections, and overall control about the visibility of your profile to strangers. As a side note, you can also control other social network interactions, and manage your profile details from here.
Communications allows you to set who can contact you or invite you to groups. You can decide how often to receive LinkedIn’s emails, and manage push notifications for your mobile devices.
Groups, Companies & Applications gives control over which groups you’re members of, and to reach settings for emails from these three.
Finally, Account is used for more mainstream features, such as profile visbility (again), email & password and homepage controls. Interestingly the Account tab also lets you request a download of your LinkedIn data. Under a link called ‘manage security settings, there’s also the option for two-step verification (which we’d recommend).

Instagram

Instagram is as simple as they come – either everything is public or everything is private. If it’s the latter people will need to be following you (and also approved by you to do so) in order to see anything associated with your account.
You’ll need to head to the mobile app to manage these settings, but once there just hit ‘Posts are private‘.

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