[BBLISA-announce] Internet annoyances needed for new O'Reilly book

[Adam S. Moskowitz]

O'Reilly is working on another "Annoyances" book, this time about the
Internet. They need people to send in annoyances (fixes or work-arounds
too, if you have them); in exchange, they'll send us copies of the book
when it's published.

The message from their user group liaison follows. If you send them
anything, please copy me and mention your affiliation with BBLISA
somewhere int he message to O'Reilly so we'll be able to get our books.

AdamM


----- Forwarded Message Follows -----
> From: Marsee Heon <marsee at oreilly.com>
> Subject: Internet Annoyances Needed for New Book
> Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2004 10:30:33 -0800
>
> Dear User Group Leader:
>
> Thanks for the great response to our call, over the last month or two,
> for annoyances, gripes, and complaints about Excel and PC hardware. The
> email we got was very useful and a lot of your members not only
> sent annoyances, but fixes! As always, many thanks for the input.
>
> This time around, we have yet another book in the wings--this one focusing
> on Internet annoyances. Some of the annoying areas: Email (and spam),
> connecting to the Net (via dialup, DSL, cable, configuration and all
> that), wireless annoyances (from WiFi hassles to hotspots to fiddling with
> WEP), web sites (namely creating, hosting, and maintaining your own web
> site), browsing and browsers (Internet Explorer, Netscape, and others),
> AOL, instant messaging, using search sites, security annoyances, and of
> course, shopping and auctions.
>
> Got Internet gripes/annoyances/kvetches? Send 'em our way by having your
> members email me (marsee at oreilly.com) with "Internet Annoyance" in the 
> subject line and we'll put our author on the job.
>
> As thanks for sharing, we'll make sure to get copies of "Internet
> Annoyances" sent to your group shortly after publication.
>
> --Marsee
>
>
> ***
>
> An example:
>
> Pictureless Pages Predicament
>
> THE ANNOYANCE: There are some great pictures available on the Web, but
> certain pictures don't appear on web pages I visit. Instead I see a red X
> or a funny little icon where the picture is supposed to be.
>
> THE FIX: Several circumstances can keep pictures from appearing:
>
> * There's a logjam at the web server or somewhere along the miles of wires
> between the web server and your browser. Try refreshing the page (press 
> F5 or click the Refresh button on the toolbar). But you probably already
> tried that.
>
> * Something's wrong with the web server. The picture might not be on the
> server, or the programmer who created the web page might have put in the
> wrong path to the picture.
>
> * Internet Explorer may be configured so that it doesn't show pictures, 
> a common setup for those with slow dialup connections who don't want 
> to waste time downloading pictures. (If this option is set, you can
> selectively display pictures by right-clicking the X or the icon and
> choosing Show Picture.) To undo this setting in Internet Explorer, choose
> Tools-->Internet Options. Click the Advanced tab, and in the Multimedia
> section, check the Show Pictures box to make your pictures appear.
>
> * An invalid value in the Windows Registry is preventing pictures from
> appearing. It's an easy fix, even for those who are squeamish about poking
> around in the Registry. (Before you mess around with the Registry, back it
> up as per the instructions in the sidebar on page 47.) Select Start-->Run,
> type in regedit, and hit Enter. In Registry Editor, navigate to
> \HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.gif. In the right pane, click the Content Type item;
> its value should be image/gif. Then check \HKEY_CLASSES_ ROOT\.jpg;
> Content Type should be set to image/jpg or image/jpeg. For more
> information about this fix, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 307239.
>
>
> ***