Barack Obama gets asked a computer science question by Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

Please read this before you message me! People keep messaging me the same question so I will post the answer here: This program is from MIT and it’s called “Assist Sketch Understanding System and Operation”. You can’t buy it or download it. This is a program that uses physics to allow you to draw objects and have them interact with each other. It’s hard to explain. You need to see it to understand.

Concise Computer Consulting, LLC, is a computer consulting firm that services small to medium sized businesses as well as the technically challenged homeowner.

Our staff has a wide range of computer and technology experience. Our team of professionals is dedicated to providing a total solution for businesses and homeowners. We specialize in on site computer service, computer virus repair, data storage solution, computer technical support, and offer a wide array of other services.

When you are experiencing computer problems, the time and money lost in productivity grows by the minute. Give us a call if you are having technology troubles and let us get you back up and running …often within hours.

Running a computer consulting company is done with the goal to improve a business over the Internet as a result of the application and use of the most adequate computer technology practices out there.

As such the objective of IT consulting firms is to set up a marketing plan for initiation into the online website solution of a business. This marketing plan includes such activities as identifying the market situation, the threats and opportunities, marketing objectives, marketing goals, and controls for tracking effectiveness.

Together these elements of the marketing plan, when correctly identified and initiated into the website solution, can provide great results in the overall success of a business over the Internet. There are a number of benefits that an IT consulting firm can enjoy from getting aid from a computer consulting business and the marketing plans which they are able to write. These benefits include:

lists the ultimate goals to work towards can function as a chart to success gives effective instructions for the operation of an online business solution acts as a reminder for what has been agreed upon can be used for reflection for analysis of achievements or failures occurring after a specific period of time

Even a small business IT consulting firm is able to help your business fulfill the following objectives through the development of an effective data backup solution as placed on the Internet:

Introduce your company and new products to the global market Extend or regain the market for existing products Enter into new business territories Boost sales by attracting more potential clients through Internet visibility and accessibility Gain long-term contracts with customers who are likely to stick around Use the Internet as a cost-effective tool for marketing and company promotion Refine your company image and products by going online Enhance the purchasing options and delivery of products with ecommerce solutions for online website shopping

This article was prepared and written by Jeff Atto of Concise Computer Consulting, LLC, located at 2150 Franklin Road, Bloomfield Hills, MI.  Please contact us for any question about your home computer or laptop.  248-745-8255

My email address is i...@concisePC.com and our website is http://www.concisePC.com

This article was submitted by Right Now Marketing Group, LLC

Ellie Rountree visits the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA. www.computerhistory.org This episode was created in collaboration with Intel! www.intel.com

Funny Pranks – Computer Scare Prank! More funny videos and pranks at www.funnyd00ds.com A simple change of the windows startup sound and cranking up the volume knob turns into a funny scary prank. Background Music “Scheming Weasel Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons “Attribution 3.0″ creativecommons.org

As the computer repair center for Oakland, Wayne and Macomb Counties, Concise maintains a client list that resembles the “who’s who” in the Michigan small business community.  They are good, and they are growing out of their digs in Bloomfield Hills.

One of the reasons that Concise is so well respected in their industry is because they take the time to explain and teach at the same time.  Let’s face it, the information highway has its own language today.  Computer techies have always had a vernacular that tended to exclude the rest of the non-techie world.  Making things worse for us non-techies today, is the next layer of computer- speak: abbreviations of all the words that we had no clue about from the beginning.

The staff at Concise will now lead the pc tech support field by offering a series of articles with those definitions of words from the computer tech support world.  This is the first offering in what Concise hopes will be a long series of definitions from the computer tech speaker.

HONEYPOT

Wikipedia defines a HONEYPOT in computer speak, as a trap set to detect, deflect, or in some manner counteract unauthorized attempts to obtain use of information systems.

A HONEYPOT consists of a computer, data, or a network site that appears to be part of a network. But, the Honeypot is actually an isolated and unprotected deadend which appears to a hacker as valuable information.

Simply put, a HONEYPOT is a seductive decoy.  It lures the attacker into a harmless area of your system where it could be isolated, detected, and hopefully discovered by cyber police.

Another use of the Honeypot is to isolate spam.  Spammers abuse vulnerable resources such as open mail relays.  Some system administrators have created honeypot programs that masquerade as these decoy resources to discover spammer activity. There are several capabilities that honeypots provide to the administrators and the existence of such seductive bait systems makes abuse more difficult or risky for the spammer. Honeypots can be a powerful countermeasure to abuse from those who rely on very high volume abuse (e.g., spammers).  These honeypots can reveal the apparent IP address of the abuse and provide bulk spam capture (which enables operators to determine spammer’s URLs and response mechanisms).

HONEYNETS

Two or more honeypots on a network form a HONEYNET. Typically, a HONEYNET is used for monitoring a larger and/or more diverse network in which one honeypot may not be sufficient. Honeynets and honeypots are usually implemented as parts of a larger computer trouble shooting system. A HONEYFARM is a centralized collection of honeypots and analysis tools.

The next visit from a Concise Computer Consulting technician should go smoother.  And, when the topic turns to setting up a Honeyfarm for your small business’s computer system, you will immediately understand that you are not about to purchase a bunch of bee hives.

Concise Computer Consulting services the small and medium sized business community as well as residential homeowners.  Concise offers every kind of on site computer service:  laptop repair service, online pc repair, pc tech support and computer trouble shooting. Concise also offers Remote access configuration, Virtual Private Networks (VPN), Web site design, Server Administration, and Preventive maintenance in the metropolitan Detroit area.  In addition, Concise diagnoses, installs, and manages both wired and wireless Local Area Networks, and even resells computers, laptops, and servers for Dell and IBM.

When you are experiencing computer problems, the time and money lost in productivity grows by the minute. Give us a call if you are having technology troubles and let us get you back up and running …often within hours.

Jeff Atto of Concise Computer Consulting, LLC, located at 2150 Franklin Road, Bloomfield Hills, MI.  Please contact us for any question about your home computer or laptop.  248-745-8255

My email address is i...@concisePC.com and our website is http://www.concisePC.com

This Article was submitted by Right Now Marketing Group, LLC.

As the computer repair center for Oakland, Wayne and Macomb Counties, Concise maintains a client list that resembles the “who’s who” in the Michigan small business community.  They are good, and they are growing out of their digs in Bloomfield Hills.

One of the reasons that Concise is so well respected in their industry is because they take the time to explain and teach at the same time.  Let’s face it, the information highway has its own language today.  Computer techies have always had a vernacular that tended to exclude the rest of the non-techie world.  Making things worse for us non-techies today, is the next layer of computer- speak: abbreviations of all the words that we had no clue about from the beginning.

The staff at Concise will now lead the pc tech support field by offering a series of articles with those definitions of words from the computer tech support world.  This is the first offering in what Concise hopes will be a long series of definitions from the computer tech speaker.

HONEYPOT

Wikipedia defines a HONEYPOT in computer speak, as a trap set to detect, deflect, or in some manner counteract unauthorized attempts to obtain use of information systems.

A HONEYPOT consists of a computer, data, or a network site that appears to be part of a network. But, the Honeypot is actually an isolated and unprotected deadend which appears to a hacker as valuable information.

Simply put, a HONEYPOT is a seductive decoy.  It lures the attacker into a harmless area of your system where it could be isolated, detected, and hopefully discovered by cyber police.

Another use of the Honeypot is to isolate spam.  Spammers abuse vulnerable resources such as open mail relays.  Some system administrators have created honeypot programs that masquerade as these decoy resources to discover spammer activity. There are several capabilities that honeypots provide to the administrators and the existence of such seductive bait systems makes abuse more difficult or risky for the spammer. Honeypots can be a powerful countermeasure to abuse from those who rely on very high volume abuse (e.g., spammers).  These honeypots can reveal the apparent IP address of the abuse and provide bulk spam capture (which enables operators to determine spammer’s URLs and response mechanisms).

HONEYNETS

Two or more honeypots on a network form a HONEYNET. Typically, a HONEYNET is used for monitoring a larger and/or more diverse network in which one honeypot may not be sufficient. Honeynets and honeypots are usually implemented as parts of a larger computer trouble shooting system. A HONEYFARM is a centralized collection of honeypots and analysis tools.

The next visit from a Concise Computer Consulting technician should go smoother.  And, when the topic turns to setting up a Honeyfarm for your small business’s computer system, you will immediately understand that you are not about to purchase a bunch of bee hives.

Concise Computer Consulting services the small and medium sized business community as well as residential homeowners.  Concise offers every kind of on site computer service:  laptop repair service, online pc repair, pc tech support and computer trouble shooting. Concise also offers Remote access configuration, Virtual Private Networks (VPN), Web site design, Server Administration, and Preventive maintenance in the metropolitan Detroit area.  In addition, Concise diagnoses, installs, and manages both wired and wireless Local Area Networks, and even resells computers, laptops, and servers for Dell and IBM.

When you are experiencing computer problems, the time and money lost in productivity grows by the minute. Give us a call if you are having technology troubles and let us get you back up and running …often within hours.

Jeff Atto of Concise Computer Consulting, LLC, located at 2150 Franklin Road, Bloomfield Hills, MI.  Please contact us for any question about your home computer or laptop.  248-745-8255

My email address is i...@concisePC.com and our website is http://www.concisePC.com

This press release was submitted by Right Now Marketing Group, LLC.

With all of the resources available to you, you may well ask yourself, “Why do I need a computer expert to maintain my computer?” The short answer is, you don’t. Just like you don’t need a technician to fix your car, repair your furnace, or do any other maintenance or repairs. If you have the knowledge and the time, you can easily repair and maintain your own computer.

But be warned, there are several potential “gotchas” involved in maintaining your own computer. If you decide to repair your own automobile, a company won’t sell you a carburetor what will break your car. Unfortunately, that’s not true of computer maintenance. There are many programs out there that either don’t do what they purport to do, perform unnecessary functions, or are just plain dangerous to install. It’s up to you, the computer maintenance technician, to determine what programs you can safely use in what manner.

In this article, we’ll discuss some of the programs out there and what the do-it-yourselfer needs to watch out for.

Registry Cleaners Websites such as Finally Fast.com and Double My Speed.com have been promoting themselves heavily of late. These (and other) sites offer products to download and install that purport to improve your computer’s performance. These programs are mostly registry cleaners. The Windows registry is simply a database that the operating system uses to store everything it needs to know to run as per your specifications. In addition, it’s available to any other program to write their information in there as well. Since Windows 95, the registry has been the recommended repository for user preferences, settings, and any other variables a program has to remember.

Over time the Windows registry will become cluttered with unneeded information, most frequently caused by uninstallation programs not removing all of the data they should. The concept of a registry cleaner is that it will detect and remove these orphan settings, frequently improving computer performance.

The problem with registry cleaners is that they will often incorrectly detect a setting as unneeded and delete it, causing problems with either installed programs or the Windows operating system itself. Registry cleaners are good, but you should never blindly take their advice as to what to delete. You should always review each entry to verify that it can be deleted safely.

And keep in mind there are freeware applications that do an excellent job of cleaning your Windows registry. Ccleaner is the one recommended by The Computer Psychic. (Go to Google and search for ccleaner.)

Anti-Malware Applications Malware (spyware and virus) cleanup and prevention is one of the most important aspects of computer maintenance. If you catch a virus on your system, you leave yourself open to all sorts of mischief – including having files deleted, getting your address book scammed and spam e-mails being sent in your name, and even having your credit card and banking information stolen! Spyware can be just as bad – it typically “watches” what you do on your computer, down to even logging keystrokes, and thus stealing your passwords. In addition to these problems, spyware and viruses are often poorly written, causing performance problems in your system.

There are dozens of applications on the market that claim to remove malware from your system. And many of them do a good job. But here’s the rub – many programs that present themselves as anti-virus or anti-spyware are, themselves, viruses and spyware! The Computer Psychic has seen all too many systems where the owner has – with the best of intentions – installed an anti-malware app into their system, only to see the floodgates opened; they find themselves with more popup ads and performance problems than they’ve ever seen before.

So how do you make sure you don’t install one of these #$%& programs? First of all, if you get a pop-up message telling you that your computer is infected with viruses and click here to download a virus cleaner, don’t do it! Without exception, these programs are scams. Downloading one of these apps will introduce your system to more viruses than you thought existed. In fact, when you see this window, you’ll be presented with an OK and Cancel button. Don’t click either one! If you click Cancel, it will still install a virus. Instead, click on the little X in the upper right-hand corner to close the window.

Secondly, if you use a search engine looking for anti-malware programs, be careful what links you follow. Malware creators will name their applications very similar to – or even exactly the same as – legitimate programs, hoping to confuse you into downloading theirs instead of the good one. For example, if you wanted to download Spybot Search and Destroy (an excellent anti-spyware program) and searched for it in Yahoo, the very first result you’ll find purports itself to be Spybot. Clicking their link takes you to a page that says it’s Spybot Search and Destroy, but is actually an application that acts as a gateway to allow viruses into your system.

So, again, you need to take the time to learn what is and what isn’t safe to install. The Computer Psychic has a very easy recommendation. Microsoft has a vested interest in keeping your computer malware-free. If they do a good job of preventing viruses from getting into your system, then that’s one less thing that Apple can beat them up over. Towards that end, in September of 2009, Microsoft released an excellent free anti-malware program named Microsoft Security Essentials (www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials). In the past, The Computer Psychic has recommended against all-in-one solutions, arguing that no one application can catch everything. But Microsoft Security Essentials is just that good. It does as good a job as – or better than – any other application, or combination of apps, in blocking any type of spyware or virus.

Startup Monitors While not as popular as the other system maintenance programs, proper use of a startup monitor can dramatically speed up your computer. A startup monitor will tell you just what programs, drivers and processes load when you start your computer.

When you boot up your computer, the operating system will also auto-start many other components – possibly a fax application, printer elements, video or mouse drivers, to name a few. These are good – they are essential for the proper operation of your computer. However, many applications add themselves to the auto-run settings for their own convenience – not yours.

For example, programs such as Adobe Reader and Microsoft Office will tell the operating system to pre-load some of their components as Windows starts up. This allows their software to open more quickly when needed. The downside of this is, even if you aren’t actively using their software, your computer is using memory running those components. Better to not pre-load those components; let the software take a second or two longer to load, and speed up your entire system.

Another popular use for the startup is for auto-update programs. These apps will periodically check the internet looking for updates. If one is found, the program will present you with a window telling you an update is available. Not only do these apps consume computer resources, they can be an annoyance.

In order to easily prevent unwanted software from running automatically, The Computer Psychic recommends a Microsoft application called AutoRuns (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.aspx). Using Autoruns you can decide just what apps you want to run when starting your computer. Once again, though, don’t blindly turn of all apps. Make sure you know what you’re disabling.

Summary

As you can see, using the tools recommended in this article makes it quite possible for anyone to maintain their computer’s health. But as with anything technical, make sure you know what you’re doing before just tinkering away.

Designed and built a mini-ITX case entirely out of LEGO bricks. Here is a time lapse of the build process, just for fun More information and pictures at tfvlrue.wordpress.com Also check out my new Lego router! tfvlrue.wordpress.com (LEGO® is a trademark of the LEGO Group of companies which does not sponsor or endorse this project or video)

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