It all started out as a fairly normal day, even though I was getting ready to go on a great vacation. I was really excited about the trip that was about to go on and had packed about a week earlier so that I wasn't rushed around at the end. I was just moving around the house doing some last-minute things when I decided that it would probably be a good idea if I were to back up my hard drive before I left. I really haven't been paying as much attention to my backups as I should, so I went online to download a program to help me to move all of my files to my external hard drive. I downloaded the program and set it to transfer all of the files from my C drive over to my external. As soon as I finish transferring the files I turned my computer off and left for vacation.
A week later I returned from vacation refreshed and ready to get back to work. I turned on my computer and walked away to put some things into the laundry. When I returned to my computer I realized that it hadn't started up at all. No matter what I tried I could not get Windows to load and that's when I realized that the backup program I had downloaded contained a Trojan horse virus.
I don't know how familiar you are with Trojan horse viruses, but they are small programs that are loaded in with other programs or pictures. They really don't do any harm when you download them to your hard drive. Once you activate the program that you downloaded, however, the virus becomes active as well. In this particular case it immediately went and erased some vital system files that prevented me from starting Windows normally. But this isn't all that this type of malware can do to your computer.
A Trojan horse virus, once it becomes active on your computer, can take many different forms. It can do tricky things to you such as opening your CD tray or causing your cursor to disappear. It can also open up a port on your computer and allow other malicious programs to enter in. These other programs can do everything from stealing passwords and personal information to taking control of your computer and locking you out of it entirely. In the case of my computer, it had corrupted files enough that I was unable to start it at all. To me this was devastating as I use my computer for work every day.
Although it took me quite a few days, I was able to successfully restore my computer. I lost a lot of data in the meantime as I needed to format the hard drive and reinstall Windows and all of my programs. Fortunately for me, my computer was in need of being formatted and cleaned anyway. I ended up with a much smoother running machine in the process. The moral of the story? Be cautious of any download and if you don't completely trust the file then don't run it.
1). Self-Cleaning Windows Glass that uses a combination of sunlight and rainwater to clean itself? Are we in Star Trek? Apparently not. UK based company Pilkington have invented a self-cleaning glass, which contains a microscopic coating that use the energy from sunlight to break down any form of organic dirt – and then automatically spreads rainwater into an even film to clear the dirt away ‘with reduced streaking. Sceptics might challenge that in the company’s home market of Britain, sunlight is in much shorter supply than rainwater – while the reverse is true in hot countries. But apparently after a week to ‘energize’ (Star Trek again), the glass works equally well in cloudy conditions. And if it doesn’t rain enough – if such a thing can ever to be true – one splash from the hose will get the broken-down dirt off. Bad news for window cleaners, from the sound of things. But good news for everyone else.
2). The Bugatti Veyron
A car that goes from 0-60 mph in 2.5 seconds, with a top speed of 253 mph – then runs out of fuel twelve minutes later. No, it’s not a Formula 1 car. You can buy it and drive on the road. And although it costs $1.2m dollars, that’s still only a fifth the amount it costs to build each one. The engineering is German – it’s built by Volkswagen. The logic isn’t. That’s why it’s got an Italian name, the Bugatti Veyron. Why would any company do such a thing, least of all a company that started off making Beatles? Apparently it was because, not having a Formula 1 team, they needed another way to show off. And show off they have. Sixteen cylinders. Not one but four turbo chargers – one for each four cylinders. A thousand horsepower – the power of ten entry-level VW Golfs on only four wheels. Now all you need to do is be nice to someone who’s got one.
3). MP3 Files These you have already heard about. But given that most of us can remember marvelling at hearing our first CD, the invention of a system that lets you store thousands of CDs in your computer – and access any of them in an instant – is quite something. It’s not all good news. Having spent most of the twentieth century trying to achieve ‘High Fidelity’ – which culminated in the CD – sound quality takes a dive with the MP3, which clips away the high and low frequencies. And there is the phenomenon of not being able to listen to a song the whole way through because you or someone else will already be putting something else on – especially annoying at parties. But if you can control that urge, the trade-off between slightly lower sound quality and instant access to all the music you could ever like is an easy one to make. For music lovers, it’s nothing short of a miracle.
4). Low-Cost Air Travel If you can plan ahead and find the time off, you can visit other countries for less than the cost of a domestic train ticket. When air travel was invented, it was a luxury experience for the rich. You dressed up and were given champagne in a glass. But since the 1950s, the airlines have steadily driven down the cost and the service – while still maintaining, and charging for, the mystique. Wrong! When Freddy Laker tried to set up a low-cost transatlantic service in the 1980s, the big airlines blew him out of the air by subsiding those of their own flights that he was competing with. When Stelios Haji-Ioannuo tried again on short-haul destinations in the 1990s, the big airlines tried the same response. But this time, they ended up in court – and lost. The cost of long haul air travel is now declining too. Bravo! What’s the point in globalisation if you can’t see the rest of the world?
5). The Internet Let’s face it – it’s the biggest invention since telephones or television, if not bigger. You can only phone people whose number you’ve got, and you can only watch TV programs that broadcasting companies have decided to put there. But the Internet is tele-everything – information, instant mail, entertainment, self-publishing, discussion. You name it, it’s there. The amazing thing is how long it took to take off. The basics of technology were first invented in 1974 in the US and a closed version for universities appeared in 1983. The World Wide Web itself – what people today call the Internet – was invented along with http and html in Europe in 1989. By 1996, 25 million computers were on the web – a good start, but only a fraction of the billion-plus online today. And with Web 2.0 – blogs and forums – any of those people can create content to be read by any other. In my lifetime? Apparently so!
Both Andrew Kasch & Southern Sun Southern Sun are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.