InBox

By DON McALLISTER

Welcome to InBox, where we attempt to answer your internet questions.

Stan's wondering why his provincial internet connection rockets along for a short time, then gradually over 30 to 90 minutes gets slower and slower and disconnects him.

That's spooky Stan - my provincial connection is doing the same thing. Chatting to a few locals around town, I find they're experiencing those symptoms too. Could this problem be happening nationwide? If you're a provincial dialup user and are getting problems like this, tell us about it. Maybe you have a solution or know what's causing it. E-mail inbox@nzherald.co.nz and we'll investigate.

More on Francis' spam junk e-mail problems from last week.

Most advice on spam says never respond and never open the stuff - just delete it. But Ross has forwarded a suggestion he learned from a knowledgeable family member in the industry. He was advised to look at each spam - without clicking on attachments. Many of the messages have an address for the message at the end which says, "If you don't want to receive this, reply to ... ". Monitor this address for a couple of weeks to ensure it is the same address each time and to be sure you're not going to give away your email address to someone who is just spraying their messages around. Once you're sure it's real you can in some cases reply using the "If you don't want to receive this, reply to" link and in some cases the spam will stop.

"kak.hta" is one of many weird problems that Cyril, an elderly user, is fighting at the moment. He's stumped as to what could be making his internet experience so unfriendly and this darn file error is the first of many strange events.

It's a virus, Cyril. Try the Norton site, where a fix is available for download.

After installing Windows XP, Kay finds the American format of Month/Day/Year confusing. She wants Outlook to show Day/Month/Year.

Your XP Regional Settings are incorrect Kay. Go to Start/Control Panel/Date, Time & Regional Options/Change the Format of Numbers, Dates and Times. Change "English (US)" to English (NZ) in the drop-down menu.

Alasdair is removing the Badtrans.b virus but Kernel32.dll refuses to be deleted.

Whatever you do, don't delete kernel32.dll Alasdair! The files you must delete are: Kernel32.exe and kdll.dll. Removing the DLL version of kernel32 will kill Windows! For an explanation, see nikosoft.net.

Norton: Wscript.Kakworm Fix

nikosoft.net: Badtrans explained

* If there's anything you want to know about the exciting world of the web, just e-mail inbox@nzherald.co.nz.