By DON McALLISTER
Welcome to InBox, where we attempt to answer your internet questions.
Unwanted and offensive spam e-mails are swamping Francis' Xtra address. She regularly complains to abuse@xtra.co.nz, but Xtra's new complaints form system is confusing her.
Xtra created the form to reduce the number of long-winded and incomplete complaints it receives,
Francis. Many complainants don't include full internet e-mail headers as they do not know where Outlook Express hides them. Though the response form seems impersonal, Xtra assures us it does monitor that address for complete complaints it can act on. So if you are using that form, keep your complaint polite, short and to the point. To retrieve headers from offending e-mails open Outlook Express, go to Inbox, right-click the offending e-mail and select Properties/Details. Highlight everything in there and then use Ctrl C to copy it. Now write your complaint to abuse@xtra.co.nz and hit Ctrl V to paste it into the e-mail. That's what Xtra is after. Also see Xtra's instructions with pictures.
Richard's mouse is misbehaving when he goes online. When he opens Internet Explorer 5, the mouse immediately halts and refuses to budge again.
Your mouse is using the "Com 1" port and I suspect your modem is set to use "Com 3". This is a common fault in older machines especially, as both ports use an "IRQ address" of 4. When the modem is being used, the computer gets confused, sending modem and mouse commands to both ports, resulting in freeze-ups. An easy, non-techy solution is to connect your mouse to Com 2 (most computers have two communication ports).
Carol (a Mac user) has a site identity certificate problem. When she tries to use Freedom Air's secure online booking service, she gets the message "security certificate has expired".
A quick check of the site shows the certificate is valid to 1/1/2021, Carol. Either your computer date is set in the future (change it to 2002 to fix this), or your Mac version 4.5 of Internet Explorer needs updating to version 5.1, Search the MS download site for Internet Explorer 5 Macintosh addition.
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