hi
some practical anti virus pointers for windows, which may help some people: step no. 2 has saved me on numerous occasions.... :-) 1) if you are unfortunate enought to be using microsoft outlook 2000 turn off the "preview pane". click on "view" then "preview pane". there are some viruses which can be activated just by viewing them in this preview pane. 2) windows is generally installed to hide file extensions. disable this by going to your windows explorer, click on "tools", "folder options", select the view tab, unselect the "Hide File Extensions for known file types" option. the reason for this is that many viruses are spread by "disguising" executable files. eg - if an executable .scr file is named virus.txt.scr, and you have the extensions hidden, you will only see "virus.txt" and will think it is a harmless text file. if you disable the hidden extensions "feature" you will see the full file name "virus.txt.scr" & know straight away it is an executable, and therefore capable of carrying viruses. file extensions to watch out for include (i think), .exe, .bat, .scr, pif, .vbs, .dll , and im sure there are many more. basically any file with a disguised extension should never be run on your computer. these two simple steps may save you a lot of headaches should a virus be sent to you, & your anti virus (basic step no. 1) not have been updated to catch it. ron
