Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2007 August 29

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August 29

Word doc into picture

I've been collaborating with a few people to create a document. It's vital that the formatting not change between computers. However, each collaborator's computer formats the word document differently. I was hoping to find a way to create a picture, which is also satisfactory. I tried to take a screen shot, but in addition to it not working, the document is too long to fit in one screen shot. We all have Windows XPs.

Any suggestions? Thanks! FruitMart07 02:07, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

There must be something like "Print to File" or "Export to PDF". Try that. —Keenan Pepper 02:14, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

PDF exporting wasn't added to Word until version 2005 (whatever they called it) if I remember correctly. You can use PDFCreator, which installs a PDF exporter as a "printer" on the computer. Print from Word to the PDFCreator to create a PDF. -- Kainaw^(what?) 02:17, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

What about something like OOo? It might give you less troubles than Word, but word shouldn't give you problems in the first place --lucid 02:20, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

As the above users have said, convert the Word file to a PDF. Another great free program to do this is CutePDF (or CutePDF direct to their website), which also installs as a printer, and you just print to a PDF file. Dead easy. --jjron 05:55, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Your description sounds a lot like the need for PDF - which was designed so that colours and formatting get preserved when you share it. The problem with PDF is that they aren't really editable - you can invest a lot of money to get something can edit PDFs properly - and some image editing software (Photoshop, Corel, etc.) sometimes manages to edit. There are free PDF generators from Word, you can look up CutePDF (see the above post). To take a screenshot (not recommended for your situation) you can consider zooming out in Word and then taking a screenshot. I think ultimately what you're looking to do is have documents that you can share and easily edit - such as Word documents, but without any distortion, therefore you could consider software like Open Office (apparently free), getting everybody to install the same versions, and hope that somehow the documents shared will all display the same. You do get more formal publishing software that might be your answer Rfwoolf 14:23, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It may depends exactly what formatting is changing. Largely, Word should preserve formatting across machines, but if, for instance, there are differences between the Normal.dot template on each machine then that may affect the formatting - what is being affected? Worm ^{(t | c)} 15:11, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your answers, everybody! I tried this out and have had great results with PDFCreator. This is exactly what we were looking for. I'm one of the main collaborators for this document, so I would know. Perfectionista777 21:42, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Internet Speed

Hello. I had my Internet speed tested by cNet. According to my ISP 295.ca, my high speed Internet is supposed to be up to 5 Mbps. cNet says that my Internet speed is about 1 Mbps. I know that cNet's Internet speed results should not be entirely taken for granted. However, that is a big difference. Something must be wrong. Is my ISP cheating me? Thanks in advance. --Mayfare 02:22, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

What your ISP says is what your connection can do at the max, while the CNET test gives you your speed to their server, internet latency and all. Splintercellguy 02:23, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Tell me what [1] gives you. Be very specific about the way you format your answer - there's a big difference between KBs and kbs. JoshHolloway 02:31, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

And an even bigger difference between MBs and mbs ;) Capuchin 07:11, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It is true that the ISP mentions the maximum speed that a user is expexted to get. But it also does not imply that the speed may dip to any levels. In fact most ISP's mention the speed in bits/sec eg. kilobits/sec (Kbps) or megabits/sec (Mbps). Whereas download speeds are generally calculated in bytes/sec although the denotion seems the same (KBps, MBps,etc.) except that the "b" is replaced with "B". The conversion is One Byte = 8 bits. So if the ISP gives a speed of 8 Mbps then the download speed will be 1 MBps. So check the units of speed first. - Gurkirat. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 164.100.147.246 (talk) 09:42, August 29, 2007 (UTC)

speedtest.net gives me a download speed of 1287 kb/s and an upload speed of 555 kb/s. All units are case sensitive. The latency is 42 ms. The server is in Fenton, Michigan, US. (I chose the recommended server). The distance is about 200 miles. Is it supposed to be like that? --Mayfare 15:22, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I would say that's very good. I have a 2mb connection (where you have 5mb) and I get 200kb/s downstream and 30kb/s upstream. Saying that a 2mb connection = 200kb/s, a 5mb connection would be 500kb/s...but you get twice that at 1287 kb/s. JoshHolloway 17:38, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks everyone. --Mayfare 20:31, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Google Maps/Earth

How do I email Google and tell them that when I look up my address on Google Maps or Google Earth the arrow points to my neighbours house? --124.254.77.148 03:22, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Does it point to your neighbours house on googlemaps (maps.google.com) or just on google earth? Most 'satellite' view pictures from close range on google earth (if no all) are taken from air-planes and aren't always exact.--Dacium 06:19, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It points to my neighbours house on both. Can they readjust it? --124.254.77.148 09:08, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

They just take whatever street numbers they have, and extrapolate in between those for addresses they don't have (which is most of them). They're not likely to change this method for you. --Sean 10:17, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

And hey, if mysterious people come and kidnap your neighbors, you can say, "Maybe it was meant.. for me!" --24.147.86.187 13:24, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Another problem happens when the photo was taken at an angle and your building is high, it will be spread sideways in the image and the location may not be correct. But a map should not have this problem. Graeme Bartlett 14:06, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Hello 124.254.77.148. Whenever I used Google Maps to locate someone's address, it points me a bit off the actual location. Relax; it happens to everyone. --Mayfare 15:29, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, the resolution of the images is better than the absolute position accuracy, so even if you can see features of your house less than a meter, the position could be off by 5 or 10 meters. They won't be able to do anything about it if you complain. —Keenan Pepper 17:39, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

And honestly, why should they care all that much? If someone was really using Google Maps to find your house as part of a trip there, they're not going to rely on a picture of the roof to tell them which one it is, they're going to rely on the number facing the street. --24.147.86.187 17:56, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Free antivirus software for Windows XP?

My boyfriend would like a new anti-virus program. He is running Windows XP and just uninstalled the free version of AVG Anti-Virus. It was working fine as far as virus protection, but he doesn't like the way it pops up windows on the screen and interrupts whatever you're doing several times a day whenever it updates. It corrupted his install of BioShock and has also caused problems with other games. Can you suggest an anti-virus software program that's free (or has a decent free version) and will do the job without him knowing it's there? Thanks in advance. --Grace 05:11, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I use avast!. It notifies you of updates etc via Messenger-style 'toast' popups in the corner of the screen. — Matt Eason ^{(Talk • Contribs)} 13:33, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I've used AVG for a long time; you can configure it not to notify you when it updates. I also have it set to update weekly. "Several times a day" seems like overkill to me. jeffjon 19:00, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I use AVG, though I don't have the resident scanner installed or automatic updates enabled. In fact, I can't even connect to the update server, I have to install update packages manually :( But I never have problems with notifications (which I can't stand)- I probably have it configured away --froth^t 07:50, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm sure it's possible to configure all that stuff, but he was frustrated with AVG and just wanted it gone (and I believe it wasn't the update thing, just AVG in general, that corrupted BioShock). I'll tell him about avast! Thanks for the help. --Grace 05:18, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

This thread made me curious, so I did some searching. It seems to be well-documented that AVG and Bioshock do not get along (just Google "bioshock antivirus"). I'd probably place the blame on the game's publishers however, for including SecuROM on the game disks. There are sections in both the SecuROM article and the Bioshock article discussing a little bit of the controversy surrounding this rootkit-like software. --LarryMac | Talk 19:38, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

How difficult is starting an ad agency?

We are thinking of starting an advertising agency for serving ads to our own website and at the same time use that platform to serve ads to other PC and mobile publishers. Can an advertising agency be started with very minimum investment ($10,000) or is it a big boy's game? The one thing which comes to my mind is collecting payment from advertisers and giving out payment to publishers. Can that part be completely outsourced? Can you name any one company that does that? What are the other challenges and difficulties?

Is there any website or book which explains how to start an online ad agency? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.96.28.225 (talk) 10:30, August 29, 2007 (UTC) Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.96.28.225 (talk) 10:26, August 29, 2007 (UTC)

You may wish to examine Affiliate marketing which is one kind of business model that could be used for very low entry cost. But don't add your URL as a spam link like many have tried in the past! Graeme Bartlett 14:03, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

The competition in this area is huge, and you can expect dirty players, the history of adware, spyware and spam demonstrates this. Graeme Bartlett 01:16, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

The problem will not be in setting up a payment system — that is relatively easy, especially with a digital businesses (just keep good records). The tough part will be soliciting advertisers, and convincing websites that you are the best ad service for them. To do that you'd have to come up with a reason why your company is really better than the ones which are already established, and have to make it obvious that you aren't just going to fold up in a day or so. Additionally if you do not have many affiliates (people running your ads), then you are going to have a hard time convincing companies to pay anything to you (you won't have enough page views).

I think you could do it with a pretty low investment. You need hardware services that will be able to deal with your ad serving, but bandwidth and space is pretty cheap these days. You need people who know how to set it up if you can't do it yourself, and that can be expensive. Most important is that you need people who are willing to serve your ads and advertisers to pay for it -- that's the hard part. --24.147.86.187 17:54, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Google Earth Help

Recently I downloaded Google Earth, and also downloaded the Blue Marble add-on. Unfortunately, whenever I click the Blue Marble Icon, Google Earth always takes me to just west of the Congo, and I can't spin the globe aropund to see my desired location. Any ideas? The Updater would like to talk to you! 10:40, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

My line-out is acting up!

The audio line-out on my computer is getting wonky (sound only comes out of one speaker unless you jiggle it like a crazy person). Is there like some USB device or something that I could plug in that would give me an extra one of those? Preferably something that would work for both linux and windows, but windows-only is fine too. --Oskar 11:30, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

There are external USB sound cards that you can get that will act as a line-out, yes. Search for "USB sound card" and you'll find a bunch. --24.147.86.187 13:40, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually, you don't have to get so fancy as a sound card. There are $5 USB to Miniplug and mic adaptors all over ebay. (Search for "USB sound") Logitech includes a similar one in their gaming headset. The sound quality is every bit as good as a card would give you. --72.202.150.92 05:07, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Video conversion software

Hello, I am looking for software to convert .wmv files to the .avi format. I'm looking for the best choice in your opinions. Speed of conversion is important, as lossless as possible. Freeware is much preferred.

Thanks for your help, Wikipedia is great for seeing what is available, but its opinions that I am really looking for. Five of Eleven 17:34, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

VLC works well for me. It supports many file formats. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.195.124.101 (talk) 22:04, August 29, 2007 (UTC)

Boo! VLC devs exhort users not to use their streaming functionality for transcoding, and I agree with them. Try mencoder, that's the best for general avi transcoding.. or virtualdub if you can't figure out the syntax of mplayer. And you should read up on avi, it's just a container format. Completely uncompressed avi is still a container format technically but it just directly contains the video, not an encoded stream.. though it's massive. Maybe that's what you're thinking of? --froth^t 07:48, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

May I ask why that is? I mean, it's not the most advanced transcoder, but if you just want to transcode something, it works fine for me. TheArv 15:00, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

The Simpsons Hit & Run

When I start the game The Simpsons Hit & Run on PC, I get an error message saying "The procedure entry point _RADSetMemory@8 could not be located in the dynamic link library binkw32.dll". What is wrong and how do I fix it?James P Twomey 17:48, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you have an old or damaged (or missing) version of that DLL file. Try Googling the file and downloading it or reinstalling the game. --Taraborn 21:24, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It looks like a video-related error to me. Try making sure your video drivers are up to date, maybe try installing the latest version of DirectX. --24.147.86.187 00:31, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

mod_rewriting

I'd like to rewrite a url, using mod_rewrite. I want anything requesting mydomain.com/hats/more_url to get the page at mydomain.com/clothing/hats/more_url. The line in my .htaccess file currently reads RewriteRule ^hats/(.*)$ clothing/hats/$1, but that's not working. Can someone please help me understand where I've gone wrong? Cheers, →Ollie (talk • contribs) 20:26, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I would expect it to be ^/hats/(.*)$ - the beginning slash should be there. Also, ensure Apache is allowing you to alter things in .htaccess. -- Kainaw^(what?) 21:07, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Turned out I was putting the htaccess file in the wrong directory... oh dear. Thanks for your time anyway! →Ollie (talk • contribs) 21:33, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Font family

If I'm using a generic font family such as fantasy, is there a way to tell the actual font being used for the computer I'm on? I've already tried some font-finding websites, so I'm wondering if there is a file where its defined. aznshorty67 21:48, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Fonts are found at C:/WINDOWS/FONTS on Windows XP. I don't really understand what you mean other than that. JoshHolloway 21:54, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Also, you can go to the control panel, make sure it's in classic mode, and click fonts. It should take you there, but trust me, there is a ton of fonts in there, be cautious. If you don't want to search through that mess, just search for the font. Jonathan (formerly Jonjonbt) 23:18, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

The questioner is asking about the generic font families in CSS. I'm afraid I don't know where (or even if) they're defined system-wide; I do know that Opera allows the user to change the defaults (Tools > Preferences > Advanced > Fonts), but I don't know if Opera's defaults are the same as Firefox and IE's. — Matt Eason ^{(Talk • Contribs)} 02:26, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, but I wanted Firefox specifically. I probably should have mentioned that. aznshorty67 20:14, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Old RAM with new RAM

If I put a stick of slower RAM into a new computer, will it hinder the performance of the computer in anyway? Acceptable 23:25, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It depends on the speed of the motherboard's bus and the speed of the CPU's front-side bus. If they are already slower than the slowest RAM you put in, you won't see any difference (as the RAM will be running slowed anyway). Usually, the answer is "yes - very little, but just enough that you might notice now and then." The worst thing to happen is if you have mixed speeds of RAM and the motherboard is too buggy to handle it properly. -- Kainaw^(what?) 03:18, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

AVI codec

Where can I download a free AVI codec for Windows Media Player 11 in Windows Vista that will allow me to watch movies in the .avi format? Thanks. Acceptable 23:43, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

AVI is just a container format, it doesn't have its own codec. What you need to do is figure out what codec is inside the AVI (i.e., DivX, XVid, etc.) and then get that. In WMP for XP you can usually figure it out by looking at the "file properties" of the movie inside WMP. Usually with codec issues you can resolve them by getting an "all-in-one" codec set, but the last time I got one of those was some time ago (DefilerPak), so I am probably out of the loop on which ones are best for Vista. --24.147.86.187 00:22, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Whatever you do, don't just install a big codec pack! Research on your own and install the appropriate decoders and directshow filters every time you need a new codec. Otherwise you're taking a performance hit, and you don't know what's going on in your own computer --froth^t 07:42, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, DefilerPak isn't exactly "big", and the codecs are pretty standard ones for internet-related things. I'm a bit surprised that having more codecs would result in a performance hit — wouldn't WMP, etc., only load up the codecs it needs? (It seems to do that, anyway). And I'm not sure codecs are really the big threat to "what's going on in your own computer"... --24.147.86.187 14:54, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

You also could use GSpot to identify the codec. Splintercellguy 02:47, 30 August 2007 (UTC)