I've written up my request. :lol: Going to submit it to my system admin (aka DAD) once you guys think it's good. Also if there are any programs you think I might want to add, please tell me. (the only ones that are not windows default are GIMP 2.4 and Apophysis which is whatever the stable version from sourceforge was about 3 months ago)

 

 

 

Also, does anyone know of a driver that is compatible with GIMP (so a TWAIN one I think), an EPSON Stylus Photo RX600, and a Brother MFC-8460N that works on Windows 2000?

 

And one that you can get to work with GIMP, a Canon PowerShot G5, and a Canon PowerShot A470?

 

Basically so I can do direct scan to GIMP/import photos directly to GIMP.

 

 

 

[hide=THE REQUEST]Things I Would Like Added to the Computer and Why

 

 

 

Name: FireFox 3.5

 

Type: Internet Browser

 

Website: http://www.firefox.com

 

 

 

Why: Internet Explorer 6 is now eight years old. It does not properly support transparent .pngs and has large security holes within it that werent fixed by Microsoft because they dont support IE6 anymore. FireFox is updated regularly with security updates and is much faster than IE6. It has anti-phishing and anti-malware software built in which notify you of an impostor or unsafe site without loading the site (it will tell you why it thinks its unsafe as well). There is also a feature that lets you make sure the site is legit before you buy something (Instant Web Site ID). When you download a file, the computers AV automatically checks it to protect your computer. FireFox has a built in pop-up blocker. It also has automatic updates so as new security issues are found, they are fixed. Simple features include tabbed browsing, session restore, one-click bookmarking, and the Awesome Bar. (See http://blog.washingtonpost.com/security ... for_2.html for information about the security of FireFox versus Internet Explorer)

 

 

 

How would it affect the computer? : You would have a choice of using FireFox or IE6. Bookmarks can be easily transferred from IE to FF during installation or later on (instructions are on the website at http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Imp ... t+Explorer ). Java and other plugins will need to be reinstalled (but they ought to be updated anyway, so win-win).

 

 

 

Name: GIMP 2.6

 

Type: Graphics Editing Program

 

Website: http://www.gimp.org

 

 

 

Why: The version of GIMP thats currently on the computer is version 2.4. Version 2.6 has new updates and works better. The full list of updates is at http://www.gimp.org/release-notes/gimp-2.6.html, here are the more significant ones:

 

o Toolbox Menu merged with Image Window menu.

 

o Toolbox and Docks always above Image windows.

 

o You can now pan beyond the Image Border.

 

o Improved Free Select Tool

 

o Added Brush Dynamics (YAY!)

 

o Text is now wrapped within bounding box.

 

 

 

How would is affect the computer? : It would replace the current GIMP 2.4. Since Im usually the only person who uses it, it wouldnt really change anything.

 

 

 

Name: Terragen

 

Type: Graphics Environment Rendering Program

 

Website: http://www.planetside.co.uk/content/view/21/36/

 

 

 

Why: Its a tool for rendering realistic looking environments thats free and easy to learn. I think it would be fun to have and I could make some cool stuff with it. Basically it has the true usefulness of Apophysis (fractal generator) but it would be a cool thing to have.

 

 

 

How it would affect the computer? : It would just use up some hard drive space in installing it. Would add an interesting toy to the list of fun stuff on the computer.

 

 

 

Other Things that Should be Addressed

 

 

 

Microsoft Office:

 

Upon starting any of the programs (except Publisher) the Windows Installer window appears, and you must click Cancel to get the program to open. In Publisher, none of the wizards work unless you open a pre-existing publication and edit it. I cannot open any Word, Excel, or PowerPoint document without a message appearing that the program cannot find the correct path, but if I have the program open already, I can. Im pretty sure that these problems were caused when the hard drive blew up, and that it could be fixed by reinstalling Microsoft Office.

 

 

 

Norton Internet Security:

 

I would like the shortcut removed from my desktop since I cant do anything with it. It would also be nice not to have the categories Job Search, News, and Interactive/Chat blocked by it. I find its kind of irrelevant because I consider Facebook Interactive/Chat but its not blocked[/hide]

 

 

 

I'm feeling pretty smug right now 8-)

All I can say is it would suck if I had to do that.

I know this is illegal in United States but I would happily give you a Kalashnikov for your birthday...

 

 

 

Unfortunately we must remain on the legal side, so good work and good luck with your paper. Looks pretty good to me.

 

 

 

BAH! LIGHTNING STORM AGAIN! Ah well, it's 5:30 AM. Time for bed anyways, I suppose.

My dad's still against Firefox... So I'm going to give him this http://secunia.com/advisories/product/11/ which has all of the security issues with IE6. Since I'm running Win2000, some that are listed as patched haven't been because they only fixed them in XP SP2 and not in a release for 2000.

 

Same page for Firefox: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/1 ... statistics

 

(NO UNPATCHED VULNERABILITIES! HMM...)

 

 

 

Are there details on what security issues weren't fixed in the 2000 version of IE6 somewhere?

I hate to be rude but your parents are... well the politest way I can think of is "incredibly technically uneducated". What is so difficult for them to understand about IE6 being one of the worst browsers on the planet? Also, how old are you, out of curiosity?

You're being very mature about the situation. I sincerely hope that you are able to download these programs.

Nice list, I really hope your dad accepts these ;)

I'm 15. I wasn't being so mature about it earlier, but I think that's understandable, considering that Firefox is a no-brainer. Plus my dad does web development for a living, and he should know that IE6 is not up to standards. The only problems with FF is that it doesn't run ActiveX (which is not a problem, if you need to run ActiveX you can't in IE6 anyway) and you have to reload your Flash/Java (which need to be updated anyway)

 

 

 

This is also the guy who got angry when my mom let me dl IE8 on the laptop, then got pissed because Java doesn't work. All you need to do is update Java, I would if I had an admin account, but I don't. Then he's all like, 'I have to take it off anyway, it's too new and there's too many issues with it,'... the only issue I've had is that Java doesn't work because the Java needs to be updated. FAIL. :evil:

 

 

 

I realize I forgot to add InkScape (open source vector graphics program, like Adobe Illustrator) to the list... I'll write up another page I guess.

 

 

 

EDIT: OH LOOK! YOUTUBE WILL BE PHASING OUT SUPPORT FOR IE6 SOON! SO UPGRADE TO A MORE MODERN BROWSER! IF I COULD GET INTO FACEBOOK, IT'D TELL ME THE SAME THING! :evil: Sick of dumb people in control of important things! -.-

I'm never in favor of lying to your parents, but since your brother also plays Runescape, could you say the same thing about Runescape? Two voices and bored children have a way changing an idea.

My brother's not allowed to use the computer with IE6, and he's mad already about not being able to play it on the laptop due to the IE8 fiasco... But that is a selling point, RS is crappy in IE6 but that's also due to the video card in this computer.

 

 

 

Found a bunch of sites totally unrelated to Microsoft or Firefox that have mostly legit reasons to kill IE6. Wrote up a sort of paper and I even cited everything. Added a screenshot of Youtube's 'we're going to stop supporting IE6 so switch now' banner at the top.

 

 

 

[hide=More letters and crap.]

 

 

 

One of the main reasons for the IE6 hate is its lack of support for web standards such as a full CSS 2.1 compliance and PNG alpha transparency. Another is its many security issues, which come with being the top browser for approximately 5 years. While no browser available supports every standard, even IE7 at least supports larger contingent of CSS 2.1 selectors, PNG alpha transparency and is a little better on security.

 

 

 

Bice, Brad. "Internet Explorer 6 compatibility." 18 June 2009. 3 July 2009 .

 

 

 

My experience in coding the recent new designs for thesitewizard.com and thefreecountry.com, both of which depend heavily upon Cascading Style Sheets for layout, is that IE 6 is a very different animal from the other browsers or even the later incarnations of IE. Contrary to what you may expect, what works in IE 8, Opera, Firefox, Safari and even IE 7 does not necessarily work in IE 6. It seems that IE 6 has a number of bugs in its CSS box model, causing sites that are correctly coded to break under that browser.

 

 

 

Heng, Christopher. "Internet Explorer 6, 7, and 8 for Windows." How to Check Your Website with Multiple Browsers on a Single Machine. 2007. 3 July 2009 .

 

 

 

The problem is a very basic, simple one. IE6 sucks. Period. And theres nothing you can (or would) do to convince me otherwise. Listen, IE6 came out EIGHT years ago. What other single piece of software (the whole of XP excluded) do you currently use that is that old? Unless its a very specific, specialized application, I suspect the examples are few and far between. According to security research firm Secunia, the ActiveX system alone in IE6 at one point had more than 350 vulnerabilities. From there you get into its craptastical (thats the technical term) support for CSS, useless PNG capabilities, and you just keep going downhill from there.

 

 

 

It takes time and resources to account for all of IE6s quirks, two things we consistently have less and less of. Whether you code around them, or hack for them, dealing with IE6 is simply too much trouble for an ever-decreasing payout. So why bother? Well have to say no at some point, and even if it means cutting off 20% of your visitors, I would argue that it might just be time to drag them kicking and screaming into the future. But thats mean, and Ive never been one to shy away from rattling the cages once in a while. So, whats the right market share at which to cut off support, and how do you address it?

 

 

 

One solution may be that you cant end support for IE6, but that doesnt mean you have to give them everything, either. This is sort of the passive aggressive approach to we dont not support IE6, but we cant officially drop it, either. We use this technique in several places on pittstate.edu. Using our CMS, we detect the user agent for the browser, and serve up different code based on that, eliminating things like fancy popups, tools, and resources. We dont restrict access to data at all, and we try to ensure the base layout stays consistent. Its just that theres no whiz-bang in IE6, and some of the coolest stuff is, in effect, crippled.

 

 

 

You can also use similar techniques, or conditional comments to include custom CSS or bug fixes that handle just IE6, but are ignored by other browsers (common for things like the ubiquitous PNG fix). This requires more work, as you have to take the time to cater custom stuff to IE6, which in my opinion is the opposite of what we should be doing. IE6 deserves less attention, not more, so I prefer true progressive enhancement, where IE6 just doesnt get the best new stuff.

 

 

 

I work in a one man web office that supports our 26,000 page site, and it made it very easy for me to simply say that I cannot take the time to deal with IE6. Ive gotten dirty looks, yes. Ive gotten an angryish e-mail or two, sure. But we just deal with it and move ahead. Its a resource issue, and I simply dont have the time to stop and test every little thing in it and deal with its quirks and flaws for 11% of our audience (A number thats fallen by 50% the past year. See, arent analytics fun!). Usually, these are elements of progressive enhancement, and I do some of the browser detection I mentioned earlier and have the page modify itself accordingly (easy with our CMS) to not serve enhanced code to IE6. I cant care; there are just too many bigger fish to fry.

 

 

 

When users complain, I tell them to get Firefox. If that doesnt work, I politely explain that its not a reasonable demand to support such an old piece of software now given our resources, and if they want it to change, feel free to write our VP asking that more manpower be added to the office. And then go get Firefox. Ultimately, people generally understand the situation.

 

 

 

Fienen, Michael. "Put a Fork In It, It's Done." 5 May 2009. .eduGuru. 3 July 2009 .

 

 

 

The reputation of Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser has been mauled by security experts.

 

 

 

The comments come after a glut of critical vulnerabilities were discovered in Internet Explorer and a delay of nearly four weeks between the very public disclosure of a critical vulnerability in the browser and the roll-out of a software patch.

 

 

 

The self styled 'chief hacking officer' of U.S.-based eEye Digital Security, which has been responsible for the discovery of a plethora of vulnerabilities in Microsoft products, says that Internet Explorer has been insecure for a long time.

 

 

 

" It has been a long running theme that at almost any given point there is a remotely exploitable bug in Internet Explorer, he told ZDNet Australia. It's one of the biggest security risks for most 'Microsoft based' corporations. Microsoft is not fixing these publicly disclosed bugs in any sort of timely manner or more so they seem to just not be fixing them at all.

 

 

 

Adding fuel to the fire is Ken Dunham, the 'director of malicious code' at U.S. based 'security intelligence' company iDefense. He says using IE exposes users to a raft of nasties on the Web.

 

 

 

" Recent exploits of Microsoft software has made it unsafe to surf the Web... it will be very difficult for some users to even know their computer is infected with a virus or otherwise compromised, he said.

 

 

 

However, Maiffret says dramatic changes are required. Internet Explorer was a poorly thought-out product. In their effort to become the number one browser, by cramming every feature possible, they have in essence forgotten about security and made a system so flexible that its even flexible to hackers, he said.

 

 

 

Anything that helps users configure and customize their security settings is a good thing, he added. Internet Explorer is very lacking in any sort of granular security to help allow customers fine tune security settings in order to still view active content, yet in a secure manner. "

 

 

 

Gray, Patrick. "IE full of holes, unsafe: Security experts." 3 Oct. 2003. ZDNet Australia. 3 July 2009 .[/hide]

 

 

 

Added Afterthought #1 - InkScape:

 

[hide=InkScape]Things I Would Like Added to the Computer and Why - Afterthought #1

 

 

 

Name: InkScape

 

Type: Vector Graphics Editing Program

 

Website: http://www.inkscape.org/

 

 

 

Why: Free open source vector graphics program similar to Adobe Illustrator. It uses the SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) file format, which GIMP cannot. I would like to design t-shirts/logos/etc. eventually (without spending the money on Illustrator).

 

 

 

How it would affect the computer? : If needed, you would be able to open SVG files, change raster images into vector images, and do vector art.[/hide]

I'm sure you don't want to rewrite that letter, but if you have limited rights on that computer i'm pretty sure you wont be able to install addons. All of Firefox's allure comes from addons, without them ie8, safari 4, opera, chrome, maxathon, k melon and orca browser all surpass it in features and quality. I would highly, highly recommend getting opera in your situation since it has enough features to surpass(in my opinion) firefox plus addons and it has all the other features that a browser needs(standards support, js rendering speed, low ram usage, good interface, customizable, etc.)

yoda, Firefox doesn't need add-ons to be better than IE. I've used Firefox for a long time before thinking of putting add-ons on it, and yet it was much faster and better than IE. I agree on getting Opera though, fits the needs more than Firefox does.

yoda, Firefox doesn't need add-ons to be better than IE. I've used Firefox for a long time before thinking of putting add-ons on it, and yet it was much faster and better than IE. I agree on getting Opera though, fits the needs more than Firefox does.

 

Without addons firefox is extremely bland, it's not the fastest browser, it's not the best at managing ram, it's not the most standard compliant and it's not the most customizable. Without addons it does not have anything that any other browser does not have.

But it is better than IE6 because it's much newer... You forget that I am stuck in the past with my internet browser and it doesn't much matter to me as long as I get rid of IE6.