My Facebook Fiasco

 

Computers usually make life easier, except when they don’t. Security features are supposed to protect our accounts but when the features keep you from accessing your account, not fun!

It all started when my page on Ancestry.com looked ‘blank’. Ancestry said I should delete the browser cache to fix it and the fix worked. However now I had to validate some of the accounts I use every day with what is known as 2-factor authentication.

This meant when I logged into my bank, credit cards, and other accounts I wanted to keep secure I had to wait for the secure form to come up to requests a code sent by text to my phone. I put the code into each secure form and happily logged into each of my accounts. It took a while with me fuming about Ancestry, but still security is important.

Then I went to Facebook. I logged in (or so I thought) the form came up and I sat waiting for the code that never came. I asked for it to be resent. I waited and waited; no code came.

 So tried something else, it offered a call with the code. The call came but guess what, the code let me in! Oh no. it still asked for a code!!!

They offered away to fix it, I just needed to upload a government issued document like driver’s license, passport, or document with a photo. I don’t know about you, but if Facebook can’t keep their SMS working, I wonder what they would do with documents like this?

I finally decided to just get a new Facebook account. It isn’t as though I can’t live without Facebook, but I can’t keep up with some folks unless it is with Facebook. So now I am trying to rebuild what I had before, but it will take time. One thing I won’t do is set up 2-factor authorization using my phone.

A search found I am not the only one with is problem, so I am wondering how many other folks have lost their accounts because they set up 2-factor authorization?

 

Why Do You Want a Registry Cleaner?

 This is from my old now defunct website "Marthas-Web". Most of this is still true.

Why the overwhelming want for Registry cleaners? Is it because of all the sites saying you need one?  Do you think it will make your slow computer run faster? (It won't.)

First of all, what does a Registry cleaner do? "Wikipedia has a definition" Fine, sounds good!

But wait a minute, it probably isn't true and you could turn your computer into an expensive door stop using a over zealous Registry cleaner.

I don't think a Registry needs to be 'cleaned' unless a system has been compromised with malware. In that event, reliable malware removers should remove the suspect entries in the Registry.  (My opinion: If you had malware on your computer, the safest bet is to reinstall Windows. How do you know for sure it's all gone?)

There seems to be some thought that a lot of stuff in the Registry can cause a computer to run slower than it should. More than likely it is all the unnecessary stuff loading at Startup and running in the background that is the real culprit for the slow computer.

There are two schools of thought here, both pros and cons for using a Registry cleaner.  Upon investigation it seems those who have bought in to the idea of cleaning the Register appear to have been persuaded by all of the 'snake oil' on the web about Registry cleaners.

The folks who should know, Microsoft MVPs, don't think the Registry cleaners are worth your time (and certainly not your money).A search for Registry cleaners brought up this:  Registry cleaners are not supported by Microsoft, but vendors of registry cleaners claim that they are useful to repair inconsistencies arising from manual changes to applications, especially COM -based programs. The effectiveness of Registry cleaners is a controversial topic.

My thoughts on the subject "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."  If you try, it can get you into real trouble.

WordPress to Blogger

I just moved all the posts from my WordPress blogs to this blog on Blogger. It was easy! But the images didn't move, so now I will have to add them back.  Will take some time, but I couldn't afford to pay hosting as the price just kept going  up and I am on retirement income and that doesn't keep going up.

I had two blogs n my old host, this one and Martha's Blog. Playing with what I can do with Blogger and adding images should beep me busy and out of trouble for a long time!

Windows 10 is Not Perfect

For a long time after I got my new PC with Windows 10 Pro, everything seemed to go OK, no problems or issues.

When each major update occurred, little ‘glitches; popped up.  Most of them were so minor I didn’t notice them, although plenty of tech web sites were documenting problems.

After the last big update in April things changed. I noticed a lot of issues and some of them, while minor started to aggravate me.

I have an SSD with 256 GB. While I don’t download videos or hoard pictures, I do keep an eye on the amount of stuff using space on my hard drive. I was glad to see the new storage ‘Free up space’ option in the April update and ran the ‘Remove files now’ that would also remove all the files that were included for installing the update and could be removed. That ‘Windows.old’ could also be removed. Except it wasn’t, not totally.

After Windows finished removing stuff, and it did remove a lot, I checked and sure enough, ‘Windows.old’ was still there. Every time I tried to delete that folder I got this:

OK now what? A suggestion from my help group, CHAD, said to get Unlocker. That worked, but why did I have to get a third-party utility to delete a file? OK it was a 'ghost' file, but why was it there?

One Thing Led to Another

I updated my CCleaner.

When I clicked on the shortcut icon on the taskbar, I got a notice the shortcut was not valid, and did I want to remove it? So, I went looking for the program to re-add it to the taskbar, but Windows didn’t list it. (I know, I know I should have gone to C:\Windows\Program Files, but I didn’t and paid for not doing that!)

I went to Piriform and downloaded CCleaner and then installed it. I know better to just click install without reading, but that is exactly what I did. I was lulled by the fact I downloaded from Piriform and not some of the download sites that add unwanted extras.

Horrors! Piriform has joined the unwanted extra downloaders! I got Avast because I just wasn’t paying attention!



Now I had to uninstall Avast. I am sure it is a good program, but I don’t need it or want it. I fired up Revo Uninstaller and Revo did its job but was unable to remove everything for Avast.

I ran Regedit and when I tried to delete the offending keys got this!



Apparently the avast key contained an embedded null character.

I downloaded the uninstaller from Avast and saved it to my Desktop per instructions and booted to Safe Mode. Should have done this before I ran Revo uninstaller but I didn’t because Revo has always cleaned everything before now.

The instructions:



Safe mode came up asking for my password.

The (not so) fun began. I tried my pin, no way. Tried my Microsoft password, nope. I finally figured out it wanted the local password, I had no idea what the local password was or where it would be located. I searched a long-time hunting for all those Post it Notes where I jot down stuff and finally found a note with random characters and numbers and tried them one by one.

Finally, I tried one that worked! I got to the Desktop and ran the uninstaller from Avast. Then I rebooted, and everything was back to normal.

Three things I did wrong. I should have reset the shortcut by looking for the executable on C: Programs.

If for some reason I did need to reinstall CCleaner, I should have paid more attention to the install and just unchecked the box to install Avast. (I don't remember Piriform adding unwanted stuff before but never assume anything about downloads because things change!)

When I first set up this PC I should have documented; what the local password is, put it in a safer place and named it. For what it’s worth, it is now located in my password keeper in notes.

All of this because I wasn't really thinking before trying to 'fix' and I didn't apply my golden rule, "If ain't broke don't fix it."

 

When Will Verizon Pull the Plug on Yahoo Groups?

I used to belong to about 20 something Yahoo Groups. These groups are usually help orientated, as in help for tech problems. They included computer help for various Windows problems, iPhone and iPad help and even Yahoo Groups help.

For the most part the Windows help Groups were the most active until recently. Now I am seeing a lot of Yahoo problems being reported.

A big problem has been happening with photos, as the photos seem to be disappearing. Just a blank square where there used to be a photo. This issue has come and gone, but is what I see today.



Some of the photos for groups are gone. There used to be a nice picture here.



Perhaps the photos are on a separate server that is having problems and the problems will go away.

Not all are gone, at least for now. They come and go. Same thing happens with files.

There is no help for Yahoo Groups now, Yahoo help just refers to pages with old outdated problems. However, the old outdated problems are still happening, no reason given.

Verizon may be going through ‘growing pains’ with Yahoo Groups.  According to Wikipedia as of August 2008 YG staff reported 113 million users, 9 million Groups. I suspect there are more inactive Groups than active. There are hundreds of thousand email accounts and a lot of them may be inactive as well.  Since Yahoo was hacked, many users either deleted their accounts or just quit using them.  From what I see and read though, Verizon does not consider Groups worth supporting, at least for now.

Since my main Group has now moved from Yahoo to a new host, Groups.io, I am reconsidering whether not it is worthwhile to put up with Yahoo.

I am not alone. Hundreds if not thousands have joined the Exodus from Yahoo and more are leaving every day.

When I try to edit settings, Yahoo shows an email address for me that I want to remove, but there is no way to find where this email is located. I have tried searching and searching to no avail.

It isn’t here on how to change your email address, Change Your email address for a Yahoo Group. Where is it?  No one seems to know. I suspect it is on a server somewhere, but I have no access to it.

I have created an alias using my outlook.com and subscribed by email to the few Yahoo groups I would like to keep up with, but only one or two of them are receiving posts. I think Yahoo users are getting fed up with Yahoo, just like me.

So very soon now I will take the plunge and say ‘Goodbye Yahoo!’ I doubt I will miss it., well maybe just a bit.

Not a Bug, User Error

 

There have been some folks that joined our new group CHAD.io. but couldn’t get messages. They didn’t show up on the member list, but insisted they joined. They weren’t anywhere to be found on CHAD.io.

Mystery solved today.

I decided to join with an alternate email, so I could test HTML versus plain text messages.

I joined, at least I thought I did.

This is what I saw after I joined.



No CHAD!



So I figured out, I did not go to https://groups.io/g/CHAD/join.

I went to https://groups.io/ and joined! Not the right link!

Groups.io is very popular, new groups being added every day. I searched for a bit for CHAD but decided the faster way would be to send my email alias an invitation to join.

This started a new problem. I had used an alternate web browser and when I got the invite and clicked the link I still wasn’t joined.  I had to ‘Reply’ before it worked.



Once I replied, almost instantly I was a member of CHAD.io.

So if you joined CHAD.io or thought you did but don’t see CHAD in your Groups:



That is more than likely what happened.

Contact us for an invite.