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Don Schlesinger: Perplexing problem
As some of you guys know, I use Netscape and not IE, and it's not easy bucking the trend!
In any event, I recently got a new Microsoft Internet keyboard and was able to reprogram a few of the IntelliChoice Pro keys to open various pages, in particular, my Netscape browser and my Netscape bookmarks.
The bookmark page worked perfectly fine until this morning, when, for no apparent reason whatsoever, pushing the button now opens the bookmarks in IE, rather than in Netscape!
It's as if Microsoft sabotaged the button and, after about a month, decided that it would aggravate me by not letting me open the bookmarks in Netscape anymore (at least not by using the shortcut button).
Now, understand that this is no big deal, since I don't need the button; I'm perfectly capable of opening the bookmarks the "old fashioned way," once in Netscape. But, it pisses me off no end that, suddenly, out of nowhere, this can happen.
Attempts to reprogram the file path so that the button works as before have all failed. Everything leads back to the bookmark's now being opened in IE.
Is Microsoft really that devious that they could actually do such a thing? Silly question; to ask it is to answer it, I'm afraid!
Thanks for any light any of you can shed on this mystery.
Don
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Clarke Cant: Answered own question alright! Not for Don
Reread your Windows manual for "plug and play," entries. You should find some wording to the effect that all Microsoft products are subject to registration verification too, in the keyboard's documentation. Thirty days is about right for your keyboard's installation to be checked. That leads to the entry in the device handler BIOS ram, leading to a post to Microsoft over the internet. Surely you don't expect Microsoft to setup a call to opening a Netscape Browser window do you?
Likely once that happened the button driven calls were repointed to Internet Explorer. Windows simply has a new device installation date and has a device poll with a serial number identifying it. Windows then checks for what drivers are present and if it is a Microsoft product, it logs onto a Microsoft site to check on updates or registrations.
It happens with all Microsoft products--hardware and software. You have just discovered still another area where Microsoft in your computer mean convienience is respelled: SPYING ON YOU. Just wait until "longhorn," which by the time it ships should be retitled, "Windows New Frontier Edition," comes to your computer. It is supposed to bypass direct file name access with an inteligent query system with plenty of similar automatic verification and update linking. Yuck. About as helpfull as those keyless security systems that are best opened with a quick polling tester that virtually every stereo shop has, and somehow never open as fast as your own key device, but I digress.
Versions of Netscape after 6.2 should be able to reprogram them back. It might still pay however to wait until after the initial warantee has expired. That version also has online spell checking and other device driver features that can help in various ways. The same will be true when Netscape 7.0 is in final versions for distribution and not just beta testing.
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