AskWoody
News, tips, advice, support for Windows, Office, PCs & more
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Latest posts
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Some tech newsletters just make stuff up
ISSUE 23.44 • 2026-11-02 PUBLIC DEFENDER By Brian Livingston Although we are already deluged with information from the Internet, our content-overload problem is being made worse by “technology” newsletters and websites that knowingly publish outrageous fictions. I’m not…
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Tokens: What are they charging us for?
RATIONAL AI By Michael A. Covington AI companies measure usage in “tokens.” What are those, and how can we control how many we’re using? Before you ask that, you may wonder whether it’s even worth counting things that are priced at a few dollars per million, or even a few cents…
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PDF tricks in OneDrive and beyond
MICROSOFT 365 By Peter Deegan Sooner or later, everyone needs to do something simple with a PDF. It could be combining two files, pulling out a few pages, or shrinking a file that’s too big to email. These are features that Adobe’s free Acrobat Reader DC does not provide.…
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Making good security decisions
ON SECURITY By Susan Bradley Providers are pushing us to two-factor authentication (2FA). Every day, I get a prompt to enroll in two-factor, use two-factor instead of a password, or even upgrade to a passkey. Just the other day, I saw that Facebook is mandating passkeys for me.…
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Finding a phone that isn’t smart
Recently a co-worker was looking for phone with a specific purpose. He wanted a phone that had no Internet connectivity and was not a smart phone. Amazingly, it was harder to find than we thought. Some that were recommended weren’t available or were out of stock. So far, we…
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Naming products is never easy
Naming a new product is never easy, but there are times that I wonder what in the world the folks in the marketing department are thinking. After years of doing everything perfectly, Apple may be hitting a wall. If I told you I was buying a “MacBook Pro with ProLED XDR Display”…
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October 26, 2026 Apple Updates
Apple released a multitude of updates Monday, October 26, 2026. In addition to the version 27.2 updates, Apple has pushed updates to its older operating systems, including a Core Graphics fix for a vulnerability that may have been exploited in targeted attacks. Apple continues…
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MS-DEFCON 4: A quieter release – for consumers
ISSUE 23.43.1 • 2026-10-27 By Susan Bradley Ladies and gentlemen, it’s time to install. This month I’m seeing side effects, but ones that predominantly impact business patchers, not consumers. Accordingly, I’ve lowered the MS-DEFCON level to 4. Install updates at this time. I’d…
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The driver problem
ISSUE 23.43 • 2026-10-26 PATCH WATCH By Susan Bradley We take for granted that our computers will boot and operate efficiently. For all operating systems, from Windows to Apple to your favorite flavor of Linux, the software we most often take for granted is drivers because they…
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My love/hate relationship with Microsoft
MICROSOFT By Lance Whitney Microsoft makes some of my favorite products, ones that I couldn’t live or work without. But it also drives me nuts with all the technical problems and sales tactics I encounter. When AskWoody editor Will Fastie asked me to write an opinion piece about…
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NixThis — Blocking Windows ads
FREEWARE SPOTLIGHT By Deanna McElveen You’ve been there: Windows adds another suggestion, button, ad, or pop-up, and figuring out how to turn the darned thing off can feel like looking for a Necco wafer in a button jar. NixThis by Builtbybel takes a different approach. You just…
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How Meta’s money will be spent
LEGAL BRIEF By Max Stul Oppenheimer, Esq. On August 26, Meta and the Attorneys General of 51 US states and territories filed a request that a federal district court judge approve the settlement of a complaint. The settlement proposal is 130 pages long (although 53 of them are…
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iPhone Duo Released by Apple October 23, 2026
The iPhone Duo made its appearance yesterday, Friday, October 23, 2026, running iOS 27.1, also released at the same time for the iPhone Duo only. In this time of rapid release of patches, it’s good to hear that iOS 27.1 has no published CVE entries. For those of you who…
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Keep those paper checks handy
Many of us are writing fewer and fewer checks. I write one to my hairdresser and that’s about it. Today I read a headline that our dear friend, AI, is starting to make life impossible for banking institutions. Major U.S. banks are detecting third-party AI agents inside customer…