"Computer Class" Update

For about two-and-a-half months, I moderated a session on Tuesday afternoon called "Computer Help Session," more commonly referred to simply as "computer class."

Up to a dozen residents attended each session, with around half-a-dozen being pretty normal. The goal was to give each attendee something which they found useful, something they wanted to learn, or something which solved a problem they encountered.

With the help of DeVere, Jim, Chet, and others the goal was accomplished. Collectively, a lot of "computer good" was accomplished this winter.

Attendees will remember that I recommended two AVG products by Grisoft, both of them available in free versions. One was AVG Anti-Virus, the other AVG Anti-Spyware. I still recommend each of these.

Recently, I have found another product which I also recommend.

But first, a little background. Julee came racing over to our trailer one morning wondering what to do because she had this screen telling her that her computer was infected and all of these terrible things were about to happen—unless she protected herself by "clicking here."

An unethical piece of advertising had found Julee's computer. It put up what it claimed to be an analysis of her computer (which it wasn't) and urged her to buy their product to get rid of it.

AVG Anti-Spyware didn't get rid of it and neither did anything else in my admittedly limited bag of tricks. Google to the rescue—again! A found a site which told me which files needed to be manually removed to rid a computer of this pest. It worked, and Julee was once again a happy camper.

A week ago, I ran into a similar problem on my computer. I found an easier solution, which I'll share with you here.

There's a program called Spyware Doctor which comes in free and for-pay versions. Their free version will not get rid of this pesky problem; presumably the for-pay version will. But wait . . . . .

. . . . . .Google offers, for FREE, a version which will get rid of it!

If you're interested in using it, go to tools.google.com. This will take you to a "Google Pack" page. At the top, you'll see several programs from which to select. Select those in which you're interested, but make sure you select "Spyware Doctor." Download it and install it as directed.

In my case, it got rid of the nasty advertiser.

I've found that it will do a "quick scan" much more rapidly than AVG Anti-Spyware, so also from that standpoint it appears to be superior to AVG Anti-Spyware.

I am not ready to say that it is superior overall to the AVG product. I've run one and cleaned out all the "bad stuff," then ran the other—and it finds more!

So which is the better? Too early to tell—other than Spyware Doctor does seem to get rid of at least some of those persistent programs which advertise by putting phony reports of infections on your screen.

That's reason enough to use it!