May 14, 2005

Flash and IE

Q - I am using Win ME and Win XP-SP2 (updated versions) on my C:/ drive. When I open a site, such as , which has Flash bases, virtual tours and digital videos, I get the error, “IE encountered an error and will be closed.” The error message is “Flash.ocx.” Then, a screen opens saying that Macromedia does not have a solution to the problem. It recommends either disabling or upgrading the flash object, which is an add-on for IE. Updating downloads same version, while disabling prevents the opening of several URLs. What should I do?

A - Ghani Tak

agtak@yahoo.com

EDITOR’S REPLY: Your problem is not the Flash Player, but IE itself. I suggest you repair IE by reinstalling Windows over your current Windows. That will resolve the problem. You can also try FireFox available at and use that when browsing for alpha objects. It’s a more stable browser than IE and doesn’t cause as many problems.

Forwarding emails
I have a Gmail account and I want to redirect all emails coming to my Hotmail account to it. How can that be done?

Ather Sharif
lara_croft76@hotmail.com

Forwarding is a premium service and you will have to pay Hotmail for it. Without subscribing to the premium service, it’s not possible to forward emails automatically to any other account.

Spacebar
WHENEVER I press the spacebar, while using Ms-Word or MSN Messenger, the words get erased, instead of the space being inserted between them. What do you think is the problem and how can I fix it?

Babar Ali Khan
Karachi

Please check your keyboard settings in the Control Panel. Check the Properties and make sure you have the standard 101/101 key US keyboard selected. In case of any other, please change the settings to Standard 101 Keys. Secondly, please get your keyboard (hardware) checked as well. Try using a friend’s keyboard if you can. It is possible that the problem lies in your keyboard only.

Previous inbox size
I CHANGED the size of my Hotmail inbox from the method given in Sci-tech World’s March 26 issue. The greed for more space has resulted in the loss of all emails saved in folders created in my Hotmail account. Please help me in, either getting all my emails back in this improved Hotmail account size, or recovering the previous inbox size with all my emails.

Asma and Sadia Tariq
Lahore

All of us here at Sci-tech World have used the method mentioned successfully without any such incidents. However, for you, I recommend you contact the Hotmail staff about the problem. They might be able to restore your mail for you. Use the Contact Hotmail Link at the bottom of the main Hotmail page.

Photo editing
Is there any software by which one can make changes, such as reducing blur, or red eye effect in digital images?

Saba
Karachi

You can use Adobe Photoshop 7.0, which is a picture editing software for professionals. However, my personal favourite is Picasa, available at . It is a powerful software, with a very simple interface and is user-friendly.

Download manager
I HAVE recently installed the internet browser Mozilla FireFox from . It is the latest version. While the browser works fine, the download manager doesn’t. The downloads are too slow and I cannot pause them either. When I was using Internet Explorer, my download manager was Download Accelerator version 7.0 and it worked just fine.

I want to know if I can, somehow, use the download accelerator application for all my downloads on FireFox. I also want to make it my default download manager for this browser. Please help.

Sajjad Hyder Wagan
strikingthefatalarrow@hotmail.com

DAP does support integration with the Mozilla browser. To make it your default manager, follow these steps:

1. Copy the file “dapop.dll” from “DAP” folder (C:\Program Files\DAP) to the “Plug-Ins” folder (C:\Program Files\Mozilla\Plug-Ins).

2. Rename the copied file from “dapop.dll” to “npdap.dll.” Your DAP is now integrated into the Mozilla browser.

Multimedia databases
I AM looking for information about Multimedia databases —the benefits they provide, their datatypes, storage mechanisms, related applications, retrieval techniques, etc. Are there any websites where I can find the relevant material?

Imran Zuberi
imranreloaded@hotmail.com

Multimedia databases are quite different from standard databases with multimedia capabilities, because they fulfill unique requirements. These requirements are typical of interactive multimedia, a relatively new class of applications. Although the term “multimedia” attracts a lot of attention, it’s really just a subclass of a large category of unstructured data called “abstract data.”

Other examples include fingerprints, X-rays, electrocardiograms and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI).

These applications require huge amounts of data storage — in fact, their storage and processing requirements are nearly identical to those of multimedia.

Consequently, a multimedia database can usually support most abstract data. In fact, the terms, “multimedia” and “abstract data,” are interchangeable.

For more information on multimedia databases, search on Google with the keywords, “multimedia databases.”

Internet speed
I DOWNLOAD various things from the internet quite often and have heard that an internet download speed of 70KB/s, or higher is possible. If, yes, then please explain how I can raise my internet speed to this level?

Sohail S. Ahmed
dr_sohail135@yahoo.com

The maximum possible download speed on your dialup connection is 7KB/s. You cannot get a higher speed than that, because of the inherent limitations of your modem and phone lines. For higher speeds, you will require a broadband connection, or cable.

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