Plain English Technical Advice

Internet Life—Playing the Lottery

Playing the National Lottery, now rebranded as Lotto, can be quite labour-intensive—you visit the shop to buy a ticket, you check the results to see if you have won and you then make a second journey to claim your prize.

That’s always assuming that you didn’t put the ticket in the wash with your clothes.

Since the National Lottery started, it has been possible to bypass all of this argee-bargee by taking out a subscription but not many people ever seemed to know about this facility.

Doing the whole thing on-line is so much easier—you avoid the hassle of queuing, keeping the ticket safe and checking the results.

All of the Lotto draws and ‘instant win’ games are available to play on the National Lottery web site.

Regular Lotto and Thunderball players can re-use the same numbers by taking out a subscription (fixed-term or ongoing) and there is a facility to give subscriptions as gifts.

Euromillions, Daily Play and Lotto Hotpicks also allow the tickets to be used in several draws.

Draw winners are notified by email and the smaller prizes are paid directly to their bank account.

Results can always be checked on-line and a record of tickets purchased is available in each subscriber’s account.

Life’s too short to queue up for a Lotto ticket.

www.national-lottery.co.uk

Communicating with your PC—Fax

Despite being an ‘old’ technology, FAX is still a very popular method of communication.

However, managing FAX communication by computer does offer some distinct advantages:

Incoming FAXes can be viewed on-screen and either deleted or stored directly on disk—no need to waste paper printing them out unless you really need a hard-copy.

Documents prepared on the computer can be FAXed directly rather than printing them out and scanning them into a separate FAX machine.

If you do need to FAX a hard-copy document, it can simply be scanned into the computer and FAXed from there.

FAX software also provides additional facilities such as transmitting at a specific time or to a number of recipients—it can also be set to try multiple times if the recipient is engaged.

Both Windows-XP and Vista have FAX software built-in so there is no pressing need to purchase additional software—most PCs come with a FAX/Modem built-in but they only cost about £15-20 if not.

Of course, using your computer for incoming FAX ties-up a telephone line and also requires it to be permanently on-line.

I overcome this inconvenience by using a FAX-to-email service which is supplied by my Internet Service Provider (Plusnet) as part of their broadband package.

The FAX is actually sent using an 0870 (National Rate) phone number to the provider’s server (in theory, never engaged) which passes it on to me as an email attachment—easily picked-up from anywhere with internet access.

Independent FAX-by-email providers also offer sending services which are usually charged by the page—as an infrequent FAX user, I simply send from my PC using the phone line.

There are numerous companies offering this service—just do a Google search on 'FAX-by-email'

Protecting your computer—Antivirus

For those unfamiliar with the term, computer viruses are malicious items of software, usually transmitted by email, which can harm your computer in various ways including the corruption of essential files.

Why anybody would want to do this to complete strangers is a mystery though it has become an increasing problem with the growth of the internet.

Adware, usually downloaded involuntarily from web sites, tends to clog-up your PC with unwanted pop-up advertisements.

Malware is really a generic term for a whole range of malicious software whose intent is to cause damage—with computers, new jargon words for the same concept spread even quicker than viruses. 

Spyware, another variation on the theme, attempts to extract confidential information such as usernames and passwords whose disclosure could seriously damage your wealth.

Illegal music download sites seem to be the main source of these infestations with 'porn' and 'get-rich-quick' sites coming a close second.    

It is also possible for hackers to access your PC directly via the internet, making those with ‘always-on’ broadband connections particularly vulnerable.

The bottom line is that up-to-date protection against these ever-expanding threats is essential.

For the personal and small-business user, the biggest names in the market are Norton and McAfee whose ‘internet security’ products incorporate antivirus and anti spyware/adware functionality together with a ’personal firewall’ to prevent unauthorised access to your PC.

Both products include the ability to automatically check for software updates and ‘virus definitions’ to protect against new threats.

I have included Norton and McAfee web site links for reference and technical support resources though you can generally buy both companies’ products cheaper elsewhere (on Amazon and eBay, for example).

Many Internet Service Providers will also scan email for viruses before they send it on—ISPs tend to use the more-expensive ’corporate’ internet security services where the protection against new threats is updated on a continuous basis rather than once every few weeks.

However, that doesn’t remove the need for comprehensive protection on your own PC as threats come from a variety of sources.

www.symantec.com (Norton Products)

www.mcafee.com

Internet Life—Shopping with Amazon

Several years ago, I started using Amazon to buy music CDs—It was my first experience of on-line shopping and it was great.

You can search the site by artist, composer, title or anything you like—you can read or contribute reviews of the music and you can even listen to samples before deciding whether to buy.

On your initial visit, you can leave your delivery address, credit card details and a password so that your subsequent purchases can be completed with a single click.

Likely delivery times are always shown for each product and Amazon advise you by email when goods are despatched—you can also look-up the status of your outstanding orders at any time.

Like many people, I was initially concerned about transmitting credit card details over the internet but this has never given me a problem and is a damn sight safer than giving your card to a waiter or providing the details by phone.

Nowadays, I buy most of my books from Amazon who also offer keen prices on a range of other goods including software and mobile phones—I still buy the occasional CD though that particular market has recently transformed with downloads becoming increasingly popular.

Also, before buying anything on the internet, I tend to consult Amazon and eBay to establish my ‘target price’ for the item—usually a good bit cheaper than high-street retailers.

Thanks to pioneers like Amazon, it is now possible to shop for almost anything on the internet including groceries, medicines, office supplies, concert tickets, fast-food, travel/accommodation and financial services.

www.amazon.co.uk

www.amazon.com