This quirky problem has happened often enough that it warrants a post of its own. The problem doesn’t happen on my desktop running Microsoft Windows XP with Office 2003. It occurs only on the laptop running Microsoft Vista with Office 2007.

I can’t tell you if it’s a Vista problem, an Office problem, or both. If your mouse works everywhere except Microsoft Word and possibly other Microsoft products, here’s an easy fix worth saving. After it happened twice, I figured I needed to save the fix information so I don’t chase it down every time.

It just happened again. I can’t use the mouse to highlight anything or move the cursor. Yet, I can still close Word and click menu items. When the problem happens, I closed Word and receive a pop up asking if I want to search for a solution or restart. Neither, but I restart it.

Tim Anderson’s ITWriting has the solution:

1. Close Word and Outlook (ignore the pop up message by clicking X)
2. Start / Run and type regedit
3. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Word\Data
4. Rename this key (I call it “baddata”).
5. Restart Word.

All is right with the Word again. For how long? Who knows.

How many times did you complete a form only to push the “Clear” button instead of “Submit”? What about “OK” vs. “Cancel” on a popup window? (Raises both hands — one for each.)

Why does this happen? Do we expect one button on the left and the other on the right? Are they too close together?

Jakob Nielsen reports that Windows applications put OK first, Cancel second while Apple places OK last. In this case, he advises developers to design OK/Cancel based on the platform they design for. The above screen shot comes from Thunderbird in Windows. The below image comes from Microsoft Word.

For Web forms, I suggest using one button. Of course, circumstances may prevent that. For example, you’re completing an order and you’re on the last page. Ecommerce sites certainly don’t want to give you another button to cancel the order, but users need assurance that they’ve canceled the order by pressing “Cancel Order” rather than just closing the window.

From my experience, I tend to read popup windows and zip through Web-based forms. I always assume software developers don’t create their popup windows the same way. But online forms — that’s another story. Silly, isn’t it? We shouldn’t expect Web designers to create forms the same way either.

Here, Nielsen gives two guidelines that make sense:

• Name a button based on what it does. Instead of “OK,” consider “Yes” when the dialog box asks if you want to do something.
• Highlight the most often used button except in cases where the action is drastic (of course, I can’t think of an example at the moment).

I think one more guideline would help especially where Web-based forms come in:

• Avoid putting the buttons close together: This forces us to pay attention and lowers the incident of “mouse slippage” that causes us to accidentally select the wrong button.

Many of us hit “Enter” when we finish a form or to begin searching (after entering keywords). Take care to prevent the application from executing something big when someone presses “Enter.”

You have to give Microsoft credit for its Windows XP shut down dialog box as shown below. Three options appear (Stand By, Turn Off, Restart) and each in a different color (yellow, red, green respectively) plus a Cancel button in gray and away from the others.

As users, we should look closely these windows and form buttons. In our fast-paced and overloaded world, we forget. Hence, keeping buttons at a reasonable distance from each other can give us the visual cue to look at the buttons.

What works for you? What doesn’t work?

I look forward to reading Mary Roach’s humorous Reader Digest column in every issue. The column reflects on things she runs into in life that many of us can relate. In the June 2007, she shares her experience in calling tech support regarding the Windows setup CD. Her computer crashed and it needed the setup CD to repair itself.

Unable to find the CD, she calls tech support. She reaches someone located in another country who is obviously a gatekeeper that routes calls. The gatekeeper asks her the same standard question that we all get when calling tech support (following the script, y’know?). Then the gatekeeper gives Roach the phone number to Microsoft.

She compares receiving a Microsoft phone number to a phone number for North America. Anyway, she calls the Redmond company where the technician reports she doesn’t need the CD because Windows comes installed on her computer. Oi!

Insert conversation here where they go back and forth and nothing happens. Finally, he walks her through using a different CD that will erase everything. To paraphrase her thoughts, “Gee, why don’t you drop a safe on my headache?”

She resolves her problem with a short trip to a nearby repair shop.

Situations like this make me grateful for the Internet, which provides us with the tools and resources to try to solve the problem on our own without making the dreaded support call. Here’s a recent example of how the Internet saved us.

Paul finally got around to installing the second dispenser in the sin that matched the new faucet and its accompanying dispenser. After he finished, the original dispenser would not pump soap and the new takes a lot of pumping to spew a pitiful amount of soap.

I went to the company’s Web site and found its troubleshooting (yes, the company uses this word even though it’s not a techie product) section. Within a few minutes, I ordered a replacement part. It arrived and it worked. This took maybe 10 minutes of my time. The other dispenser, however, took more effort as it didn’t appear in the list of products for troubleshooting.

After more research, I had to submit a customer service e-mail. The first e-mail said the company hoped it resolved my problem, but there was NO solution in the e-mail. I replied asking for the solution. The company said it sent a replacement part. Now we wait to see if it arrives. If it does and it works, I will have spent less time resolving this problem than it would take me to finally get to the right person in a relay phone call.

Update a few hours later: Of course, the replacement part arrived today after I posted this entry. Actually, I received the entire thing. Back to nagging Paul to get around to installing it. Let’s hope it works.

This problem comes and goes. When it comes, however, the problem happens a few times a day. I can’t find the pattern except maybe Internet Explorer. The programs slow to a crawl and I close each one as soon as the PC lets me. I tried to find the Microsoft Knowledgebase (kb) article that sounded much like the problem I’m having, but can’t relocate it.

I’ve studied the KB articles and the problems don’t apply to my situation. I have Windows XP SP 2, I don’t have the speech app running, and a few other things. There’s not enough information to narrow down the search. Strange situation considering the problem stops for a while and then starts again, and does it repeatedly.

Wish I could narrow down the problem and have more information. This is too broad to find the right information.

You use Ctrl+Alt+Del to see what’s running on your PC, to close crashed programs and processes, and to check performance. You probably avoid a few processes whose names mean nothing to you, but they’re essential to Windows. svchost.exe sure likes to appear all the time and multiple times at that. What’s taskmgr.exe? Oh yeah, it’s the window you’re looking at right now. ctfmon? Is he related to Pokemon? navapsvc.exe? Navy? Napa Valley? Navel? NOTA (none of the above).

This is not a comprehensive list as that would take days. It has the standard processes as well as process names from popular applications. If you want to know about a process, the best place to go is… ProcessLibrary.com. Just like adware and spyware, there are bad processes that come to life thanks to the bad guys like Trojans and viruses. The site has a list of the top five security threats, so watch out for those processes.

acrotray.exe

Acrobat Assistant that is used when printing documents to a PDF. The process should not be removed while converting documents to PDF.

ADService.exe

Active Disk Service is a component of the Iomega zip drive.

AppServices.exe

Also for the Iomega zip drive.

ccEvtMrg.exe

Associated with Symantec’s Internet Security Suite. Keep it and protect your PC.

ccSetMgr.exe

Also associated with Symantec’s Internet Security Suite. Keep it and protect your PC.

csrss.exe

System process that is the main executable for the Microsoft Client / Server Runtim Server Subsystem. It should not be shut down.

ctfmon.exe

non-essential system process. If you’re using only English as the language, then it is not needed. However, it’s recommended to leave it alone.

explorer.exe

This must always be running in the background. It’s a user interface process that runs the windows graphical shell for the desktop, task bar, and Start menu.

iexplore.exe

Internet Explorer browser. But why are you using it unless it’s for a site that doesn’t work in any other browser? Use Firefox instead.

lsass.exe

Local Security Authority Service is a Windows security-related system process for handling local security and login policies.

Navapsvc.exe, nvsrvc32.exe, and navapw32.exe

These are Symantec’s North AnvtiVirus processes. They or whatever virus program you use should run all the time.

realsched.exe

RealNetworks Scheduler is not an essential process. It checks for updates for RealNetworks products. It can be safely disabled.

rundll32.exe

A system process that executes DLLs and loads their libraries.

savscan.exe

Nortons AntiVirus process. Keep it.

services.exe

An essential process that manages the starting and stopping of services including the those in boot up and shut down. Do not terminate it.

smss.exe

Session Manager SubSystem is a system process that is a central part of the Windows operating system. If you try to kill it, it will be difficult… hence, the importance of leaving it be.

spoolsv.exe

Microsoft printer spooler service handles local printer processes. It’s a system file.

svchost.exe x 6

You may have more than six appearances of this process or less. It’s there multiple times to handle processes executed from DLLs. Leave it there.

System

This is a file that stores information related to local hardware settings in the registry under ‘HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE’. Kill it and kiss your PC’s stability bye bye.

System Idele Process

calculates the amount of CPU currently in use by applications. This won’t go away no matter how hard you try. Don’t try it, OK?

taskmgr.exe

Appears when you press Ctrl+Alt+Del.

wdfmgr.exe

Windows Driver Foundation Manager is part of Windows media player 10 and newer. Better not to stop the process.

winlogon.exe

Handles the login and logout processes. It’s essential.

winword.exe

The great Carnac says, “You’re running Microsoft Word.”

Don’t panic if you see something you have on the “bad guy” list. svchost.exe is important, but some are good guys and some are bad guys. Do your research before deleting anything. For instance, I have admin.exe, which has been reported as a bad guy. However, it is the admin process for one of my programs. When I closed the program, admin.exe also went away.

Previously, I provided an overview of Windows Error Reporting. Someone wrote and said he never received resolutions to his problems when submitting an error report. I don’t know if this happened to him or not, but it may not be obvious that Microsoft is providing a possible solution.

I got an error after writing this report and submitted it to Microsoft. After it finished, the following window appeared. Click on “more information” to get details about the problem and a possible solution. When I clicked on it, it takes me to the Microsoft Online Analysis Web page and provides the following information.

Clicking on “Word Quits…” takes me to a knowledgebase article for details. Some problems probably have multiple possible solutions and there would be a bulleted list of other knowledgebase articles.

Maybe instead of “more information,” it would be better for the link to say, “More information and possible resolution.” “More information” might lead people to believe it’s tech speak about the problem and people don’t have time or interest to read that, so they close the box instead of clicking on it to see what is really behind the link. I’ve been guilty of that before.

I get, “The system has recovered from a serious error” message from time to time (see the screen shot) with two buttons: “Send Error Report” and “Don’t Send” regarding sending the report to Microsoft. The error message appears when an application runs into a problem it can’t handle. When this happens, XP stops the app and the error report prompt appears so you can send the error report to Microsoft if you’re connected to the Internet.

In the case of hardware or a driver (software managing hardware) attempts something that could cause problems, XP puts up that annoying BSOD (blue screen of death) and the computer is either restarted or you have to turn it off and back on. System error reports go to the Microsoft Online Crash Analysis Web site, aka MOCA. Go figure – the Web site drops the ‘M’ in the URL.

When one of them error report windows pops up and you decide to let it send a report to Microsoft, be sure you’re connected to the Internet before hitting the “Send Error Report” button. Behind the scenes, XP creates a short message describing the error and provides additional information such as operating system version, failure type, language, cause of the problem, etc. to help Microsoft resolve the problem. The message is encrypted.

In the error report window, there is a link “click here” for seeing what the data report contains. After you send the report, you’ll get a message from MOCA with the steps on how to solve the problem and other information depending on the problem. Such information could be links to downloading updated drivers and how to prevent the problem from happening again.

What about when getting errors from a non-Microsoft application or hardware? MOCA reports these errors to the company behind the application or device, so it can be helpful to send these forward. So those of you who never send non-Microsoft-related errors might want to reconsider.

You can also use MOCA to track errors when you get BSODed. This Microsoft Knowledgebase article shows how to use error reporting.

Many people don’t use the reporting at all because of privacy concerns. We’ve heard plenty of jokes about how Microsoft knows everything about everyone who has a computer. You can read Microsoft’s error privacy information to get exact details on what Microsoft learns about your computer when getting such reports.

Error reporting is not just for Microsoft, but pays off for you since it can help reduce the problems with your computer when you get the error resolution messages back from MOCA. You can turn off error reporting, but I don’t recommend it.

Since I am recovering after two hospital visits in less than two weeks, I’m spending most of my time in bed with my laptop. However, my desktop has most of my emails and other things on it that aren’t reachable even when file sharing. The solution. Using Windows XP’s built-in Remote Desktop.

Now I am using my desktop as if I am in front of it, only from the comfort of my bed with laptop on my lap. The desktop is still where it is… out there in the family room. Remote Desktop opens a window and you see your desktop (or rermote computer) exactly as if you’re in front of it. At the top is a light-colored border with the name of the desktop to remind you that you’re on that computer. I can’t provide a screenshot since it’s invisible no matter what I use in taking the picture.

This screenshot (click to see a larger image) shows how the screen looks if you have the Remote Desktop window not taking up the entire screen. When it takes up the entire screen, it looks no different than when you’re working on your computer except for the bar on top.

Remote Desktop in Windows XP shows how to it up step-by-step with pictures. Once you’ve done that, connect to it from another computer (instructions in tutorial under “Instaling client software”) by going to Start > All Programs > Accessories > Communications > Remote Desktop Connection. Enter the name of the desktop and the password. If you don’t have a password on the desktop, you need to assign one otherwise it won’t work.

If I go to my desktop and login, it will disconnect my laptop and vice versa. So if you’re working on the remote desktop and get disconnected, you know what that means… someone logged in on the other end.

If you have Windows 2000, I believe it does not come with Remote Desktop, but you can download it from Microsoft. There is also PCAnywhere. For older products, you may have to use Terminal Server, PCAnywhere, GoToMyPC, or some other third party product.