Kevin’s Stories and Columns

Students are using USB thumbdrives to carry a lot of their work between school and home, but those handy devices might accidentally carry a virus that could infect another computer if the user isn’t careful.

“I know the antivirus is supposed to be doing its job. It’s like a security net, you know there’s something there to protect [the computer],” said Tyler Tzech, a student at Lethbridge College.

Having an antivirus program as a primary means of protection on any computer in today’s world is important, but people should be careful not to solely rely on it to be reactive to possible threats. We need to be proactive to prevent any problems in the first place.

“User behavior is important. Don’t go to sites that seem to be faulty or phishing for something. That’s as important as the software itself, I think,” says Tyson Wiebe, who works in the Library Commons at Lethbridge College.

Websites that look real in every sense, but are in fact only imitating reputable websites, such as eBay or YouTube, and are designed to collect personal information for malicious purposes. This technique is called ‘phishing’, as in fishing for information.

Being proactive against internet threats such as viruses and spyware can help prevent incidents such as the Lethbridge College virus outbreak in 2004.

“The last one was September of 2004,and I think it was called ‘Blaster’,” recalls Dean Johnson, manager of network services at Lethbridge College.

According to a message sent to IT managers at the time of the outbreak in 2004, “the Help Desk received calls from various areas on-campus that some staff/faculty computers were popping-up with virus alerts.” “The problem was limited to the staff/faculty areas and the academic labs were only seeing a slow-down of network/Internet traffic.”

The message continued to explain that computers located around the college campus were tested and cleaned if infected. It took a few days to locate and clean staff and student computers, an experience the college quickly learned from.

“We now have a McAfee server that forces updates to all college owned computers, so this type of problem has not happened since then,” says Johnson.

Users should make it a habit to make sure their antivirus is updated and that anything going from their computer to another computer is virus-free, but the most important thing of all is to be smart about what you download and the websites you visit.

SIDEBAR:

Partial source: techguylabs.com

1. Don’t open email attachments

2. Don’t click links in email.

3. Don’t download files from places you aren’t absolutely sure are safe.

4. Update your Operating System regularly!

5. Use a firewall (hardware router).

6. Never run as an administrator

7. Use an effective and updated antivirus program

Originally posted 2008-12-04 18:34:18. Republished by Old Post Promoter

The Heart and Stroke Foundation of Alberta is boosting its publicity during the month of February to remind people that to live long and happy lives, we must take care of ourselves, and that includes our hearts.

“In Canada, every seven minutes, a person will have a heart attack. 17,000 people die each year [from heart attacks],” says Valerie Fraser, who works with the Heart and Stroke Foundation in Medicine Hat. “We really push the importance of looking after our hearts.”

The best ways to take care of our hearts are pretty obvious, including not smoking, if you do drink, do so in moderation, limiting stress, and of course, exercise. These are things we’re all aware of, but many people don’t follow these simple guidelines that can help them live longer, and we need to.

“High on the list is smoking. Please don’t smoke; being inactive, high blood pressure and high cholesterol,” says Fraser. “Age, gender, family history are [also] general risk factors.”

Another risk factor to our general health and our hearts is stress, something we all deal with, and if we don’t take steps to handle it, it can have harmful effects on our bodies and our hearts.

“We all have stress in our lives, we need to learn to manage it,” says Fraser.

If you feel you are at risk for heart disease or heart attack, it’s very important that you go and see your doctor, and make him or her fully aware of your family history, so you can work to prevent a heart attack.

People need to take care of their bodies, and their hearts. If we don’t, we might not live as long of a life as we might like.

“You only get one body. You get one chance to take care of it,” says Fraser.

The Heart and Stroke Foundations also wants to remind students and those in Alberta communities, including Lethbridge, to volunteer their time to spread the word of the importance of taking care of our hearts and to raise money for the foundation.

“If students are interested in helping with the fundraiser, contact the Lethbridge [Heart and Stroke Foundation] office,” says Louise.

Originally posted 2009-02-01 03:27:51. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Kevin Mertz, service technician at Saturn of Lethbridge

When you go to buy a car, some of the things you want to know are how good the gas mileage is with the cost of fuel, how well it handles, and the safety features included if you ever get into an accident.

All of those features are controlled by technology, and nowadays, mechanics need to be as savvy with computers as they are under the hood.

“You also have to know how the electronics work together with the mechanical parts. You have to find out if it’s an electronic problem before you can determine if it’s a mechanical fault,” says Kurtis Ruston, a Toyota certified master hybrid technician.

Many of the systems built into vehicles have made driving much safer and more reliable, and according to one mechanic, we’re safer on the roads because of it.

“There’s no question that electronics have vastly improved the safety of cars. With the monitoring of seatbelt systems, with the advent of crash sensors, the car can automatically sent a signal to the authorities to send help. The pros outweigh the cons, “ says Murray Charles, service manager at Saturn of Lethbridge.

Mechanics are doing just as much hands-on work as ever, but now with the aide of computers, they can find out what the exact problem is faster and more reliably.

“They’re dealing with as much hands-on as they ever did, but [now] with electronic assistance. All of the work we do [is] connected to [scanning tools]. [This makes diagnosis] more accurate. The better we can diagnose the car, the more effective we can repair the cars,” says Charles.

A great deal of the technology built into vehicles these days is required by law, and it makes driving safer.

“All vehicles these days are required to have electronics and safety devices on board, for passenger safety of course. [There are] technologies involved there, [so] there typically can be high costs involved,” said Charles.

According to Ruston, finding a mechanic isn’t hard, but it seems the bigger issue is keeping mechanics, since those without passion for the job move on quickly.

“The government is helping people out with grants and tax breaks on the tools you buy, where when I was apprenticing, we didn’t have any of that. They’re slowly catching up, helping you get into this trade,” said Ruston.

Like in any other trade or job, finding people isn’t hard, but finding people with a passion for the work and with the skills necessary is difficult.

“It’s not hard to get people to work in the trade, it’s hard to find quality people,” stated Ruston.

Another benefit of computerized components is that they don’t wear out nearly as fast as their mechanical counterparts, making the car last longer.

“You get a lot more life out a car then you would 15-20 years ago because there’s a lot less maintenance costs, stuff doesn’t wear out now like it did 15 years go.”

Originally posted 2008-10-31 04:13:29. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Stress, crowds, public speaking, a job interview, or being overwhelmed by too many homework assignments can all trigger panic attacks in some people. Although they are physically harmless, they are very bothersome to those that experience them.

The health clinic located at Lethbridge College sees many students and even some staff members who come in complaining of anxiety or stress related symptoms.

“We most definitely people, students and staff that come in here,” says Mary Coles, head nurse at Lethbridge College. “A lot of times, they’re presenting with some chest pain, and they’re having trouble breathing and they’re hyperventilating, and they’re very panicked.”

Coles also says that the first thing the nurses and doctors at the clinic do is rule out anything organic, such as the possibility of a heart attack, and they will check for vital signs, putting patients on oxygen and check for a variety of different symptoms.

After ruling out things such as a heart attack, they focus on calming the affected person down.

“We have to then calm them down, and one of the very best [ways] to do that is to do a series of three deep breaths,” says Coles. “You take a breath in very, very deeply, but when you’re blowing it out, you have to have a lot of resistance in your lips, like you’re blowing up a balloon, so [it will take longer to exhale].”

Nurses will get the patients to imagine themselves in an environment that makes them happy in order to slow their breathing.

“Having them do visualisations [of] things that, in the past, have been a place of calm and content for them, Looking up at the sky, seeing a flock of geese, watching the clouds float,” says Coles.

Symptoms of a panic attack can include shortness of breath, sweating, shaking, chills or hot flashes, tightening of the chest, dizziness, tingling, and it may feel like a person’s heart is jumping out of their chest. They often come on suddenly and without much warning. Some people worry that they may be having a heart attack or a stroke, which is why panic attacks are so frightening.

If panic and anxiety symptoms keep reoccurring, people may need to try medications that can help stop or at least lessen the impact of anxiety and panic symptoms.

“One of the most common is Effexor, it’s [an] anti-anxiety, and a bit of an anti-depressant. [It] seems to be one of the better ones,” says Coles.” Ativan can make you feel quite sleepy, it’s [for crisis situations], it’s quick acting.”

A panic attack can last between 5-10 minutes.

According to AnxietyBC.com, “people with a phobia of dogs might have a panic attack whenever they are near a dog. But in this case, the panic attack is expected, and the person is afraid of the dog, not the panic attack.”

Everyone feels anxious from time to time, and often a sense of panic as well depending what kind of situation they are in, be it working last minute on a homework assignment, or rushing around town to get errands done. These feelings are normal, but it’s when they are too much for a person to bear that they become a problem.

“Panic disorder, in particular, will affect about 3.7% of Canadians in their lifetime (just under a million people) and affects 1 to 2% in a given year. On average, it appears in a person’s mid-20s, and like most other anxiety disorders, is treated more commonly in women than in men,” explains heretohelp.bc.ca.

Originally posted 2009-02-06 17:51:25. Republished by Old Post Promoter

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Originally posted 2008-10-31 09:14:42. Republished by Old Post Promoter

NOTE: I realize this article is no longer current, since it was published on April 1st. I just kept forgetting to email the story to myself, which is why I’m posting the story now for portfolio sake.

Despite all the advance hype to the contrary, it appears computer systems in Lethbridge survived the Conficker computer worm scare unscathed Wednesday. Local experts say all the attention focused on the potential carnage shouldn’t be viewed as wasted time, however.

“It’s always a valuable opportunity to educate the public,” said Darren Shell, information security manager at the University of Lethbridge.

As of April 1, the worm was programmed to “call home” for additional instructions, though it is not clear what those instructions were. A quick survey of some of the city’s largest institutions which rely heavily on computers Wednesday revealed no major problems, causing some to compare it to the null event of the supposed Y2K computer bug as year 2000 rolled in.

Although it, too, was spared, the City of Lethbridge wasn’t taking any chances.

“We keep the systems up-to-date on an ongoing basis for any virus that may be coming our way,” said Sabina Visser, the general manager for information technology at the City of Lethbridge. “In preparation for Conficker, we ran scans to confirm we haven’t been infected.”

The Conficker worm has had many variants since first appearing on the Internet in November of 2008. In January, a version was released that had the ability to spread through network shares, USB drives, and peer-to-peer networks.

The latest version was supposed to be able to shut down security software, and block computers from accessing security vendor websites.

If computer users aren’t sure if they might have been infected with the worm or another Internet virus, local experts say the inability to enter tech support websites like Microsoft.com or TrendMicro.com is an indication they may not have escaped the bug.

According to a CBSNews.com video, “as many as 10 million computers have been infected. The worm is now living on millions of computers, mainly in corporations. So far, the bad guys haven’t triggered Conficker, it’s just sitting there, like a sleeper cell.”

” I think this is going to be a big problem in countries where computers can’t be updated, because they’re running pirated software,” said Dean Johnson, manager of network services at Lethbridge College.

Whether it’s the Conficker worm or some other virus which threatens to cause turmoil in the future, those in the industry all seem to agree that being proactive on a corporate and consumer level is key. Everyone needs to be much more careful in what websites and links they click on, because it only takes a moment for a computer to become infected.

“Keep your antivirus up to date, (and don’t open) attachments you don’t recognize,” said Ray Still, a computer technician with Geek Delivery in Lethbridge. “Be careful of websites, of what you’re downloading, (and) don’t let your computer think for you, because it can’t.”

Originally posted 2009-04-15 21:19:46. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Raphaelle deGroot wants to give new meaning to the countless items people have stored in their closets, under their beds, and in their storage rooms. In her new exhibit, The Burden of Objects, deGroot wants the community to bring in such items to the Southern Alberta Arts Gallery in Lethbridge.

“They make it disappear, they don’t use it anymore. Somehow, they haven’t gotten around to throwing it out,” says deGroot.

The same people are invited to join workshops in which participants will collaborate and discover new uses for those everyday items.

“We [will] engage in unrehearsed games that lead us to seeing them in a different way, like sorting them, dismantling them, and looking at their parts, seeing them in association with others, [and] inventing new stories about these objects,” says deGroot.

“Eventually, I will leave Lethbridge with these objects; the community’s burden will become mine. Maybe I’ll do that in other cities, too; this really has started here, [an] idea born in Lethbridge.”

deGroot has been in countries throughout Europe, and across Canada doing similar projects, all of which require community participation, and that’s by design, it’s how she works as an artist.

“I’ve travelled a lot, because all of these projects bring me to lots of different places. I did a project in a textile factory in Italy. I exhibited in Italy, England, [and France], I speak all three languages,” explains deGroot.

deGroot has been a professional artist for more than 10 years. She finished her Bachelor of Arts and her Masters at the University of Quebec in 1997 in Montreal, where she’s from.

Since then, she’s gone where people and places have inspired her to create her exhibits.  She never knows exactly how each project will end, but in her research, she always knows how it will start.

“I never know how they’re going to end. It’s step by step, like how people are going to respond to what I’m asking them [during a project],” deGroot explains.

When asked what brings her to each community, deGroot says it’s all about networking and connecting with people and with places. It’s not a particular inspiration.

“It’s not the fact that they invite me and I come. It’s a matter of how do I live while I’m here,” says deGroot.
Each project costs money, and so does each plane ticket, not to mention the cost of living in each city.

To solve this, deGroot finds a job within the community to pay for the cost of each project, and in the case of her current Lethbridge project, she was able to obtain a grant to cover her costs of living.

“We’re arranged with the University, [which] is kind of a partner in this project. While I’d be here at the gallery, [I will] also be teaching a course. So, I’m more linked to the community, more grounded,” says deGroot.

“As you might know, the gallery here in closing and they’re renovating. They’re opening, in March, a temporary space. They have this year coming up on exhibitions and projects that deal with this idea of renovation, renewal, and transformation,” says deGroot about why she was invited to show her exhibit at the gallery.

deGroot’s exhibit, The Burden of Objects, will open in the Southern Alberta Art Gallery’s temporary downtown Lethbridge location in early March. The temporary gallery is located at 324-5th Street south (the 3rd Street location is under renovation).

Interested participants can bring their objects in a bag or box, where they will be given a questionnaire to fill out about each object, along with a short description about the item.

People can participate with their objects on March 18 and April 1st from 5pm to 7pm. Everyone in the community can join in. There are no fees to participate.

Originally posted 2009-02-28 20:14:45. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Since there isn’t an edition of the Endeavour coming out this week, due to Remembrance Day, I won’t be posting any new stories this week. There wasn’t school on Monday or Tuesday. Next week, I will post two stories, a column, and a news feature (which may or may not appear in the Endeavour at some point). I’m gonna be a busy guy.

Originally posted 2008-11-12 02:03:17. Republished by Old Post Promoter

(this article is in it’s full entirety. The newspaper version was edited down for space considerations)

The replacement for WebCT will arrive in the next year. The college is looking at a couple of different possibilities, the most likely candidate being a system called “Angel”.The other two possibilities are “Moodle” and “Blackboard”. Lethbridge College and SAIT are the only two institutions in Alberta still using WebCT.

The college has been taking it’s time to survey and research why WebCT is no longer meeting the needs of students and instructors. Many complain the system is too difficult to use, while others say it’s hard to find what they’re looking for.

Outsourcing the project will enable the college to join the scores of other institutions in Canada and the United States who have handed the management of their systems to private companies. The process is also associated with the term “Cloud Computing”. Instead of every major company running their own servers, private companies do the work for them.

The possibility of outsourcing the management of the new Learning Management System (LMS) to an outside company, not only for reliability, but for better support and security.

“Where we should be right now, according to our plan, is implementing our LMS. Our plan got derailed because of two things…FOIP and the Patriot Act. If we host it off-site, it has to be within Canada. We won’t be making a decision until the middle of October, so our whole process got pushed back about six months.” Explains Dwayne Harapnuik, manager of education technology at the college.

It was rumoured since last January or so that a new system would be in place for the fall term. Obviously, it’s not. However, the college has given itself extra time to explore the best way to implement their new plans and create a better experience for staff and students.

“One of the advantages we have in taking our time is that when we do make a switch, there’s enough experience to show that this is the easiest way [to implement the new system], the path of least resistance.” Mr. Harapnuik told The Endeavour.

The biggest reason the college is leaning toward the “Angel” system is because it’s so easy to use and very customizable. During initial tests, students and faculty were easily exploring the system within minutes.

“Once you use technology that is well made and well designed, you realize what you can do. Angel is so easy, we probably wouldn’t have to train anyone to use it. It’s just that simple. It’s so straight forward, so intuitive.” Harapnuik said with enthusiasm.

“Once you use technology that is well made and well designed, you realize what you can do. Angel is so easy, we probably wouldn’t have to train anyone to use it. It’s just that simple. It’s so straight forward, so intuitive.” Mr. Harapnuik said with enthusiasm.

To learn more about the Angel system, you can visit http://www.angellearning.com, or Harapnuik’s website at http://learn.lethbridgecollege.net.

Students and faculty should expect to see the new system, the most likely choice being “Angel” in place possibly as early as Christmas, on a trial basis, and fully deployed by sometime in 2009.

Originally posted 2008-09-26 21:59:37. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Over 400 people have become sick from an outbreak of Salmonella in the United States, and authorities are scrambling to find out why. The U.S. government thinks they may have found the source of the outbreak, a jar of King Nut peanut butter, a brand that is distributed across the United States.

We called some local grocery stores in Lethbridge to find out if they carry the King Nut brand of peanut butter, and they do not, and they suspect it’s only sold in the United States, so that should ease some worried minds.

Many of us have heard of Salmonella, but may not know exactly what it is, or what to do if you discover it’s made you sick.

“Salmonella is a bacteria, an infection of the intestines,” explains Andrea Hohne, Public Health Inspector for Chinook Health. “[You can get Salmonella] by eating undercooked meat and poultry, drinking raw (unpasteurized) milk, [or] contaminated food or water.”

Salmonella poisoning can present many symptoms that are similar to a stomach flu, and Hohne strongly recommends anyone with these symptoms immediately see their doctor to find out the exact cause.

“In general, [the symptoms include] vomiting, nausea, diarrhea, cramps, and fever,” says Hohne. “[symptoms can show] 6 to 72 hours after being infected.”

One website, Healthsquare.com recommends anyone recovering from Salmonella poisoning “rest in bed at least 3 days after your symptoms go away”, “use a heating pad or hot water bottle to help relieve stomach cramps,” and “drink plenty of liquids that have a lot of minerals and vitamins in them until the diarrhea stops”, as this will replenish the nutrition your body expelled along with the bad bacteria.

This brings up the issue of food poisoning, as well as how to tell if you’ve become a victim, and how to avoid becoming sick in the first place.

“Cook meat or poultry to the correct internal temperature, 74 degrees celcius, [and] check with a thermometer,” says Hohne, adding that people should always wash their hands before eating to prevent any bacteria from entering your body.

If you happen to suffer from food poisoning, emedicinehealth.com suggests watching out for additional symptoms, including, “fever and chills, bloody stools, dehydration.

The same website also shares some interesting stats, such as the “Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that in the United States, food poisoning causes about 76 million illnesses, 325,000 hospitalizations, and up to 5,000 deaths each year.”

Another statistic explains that “more than 250 known diseases can be transmitted through food. The CDC estimates unknown or undiscovered agents cause 81% of all food-borne illnesses and related hospitalizations. Many cases of food poisoning are not reported because people suffer mild symptoms and recover quickly.”

Food poisoning can be easily avoided by simply making sure your food is completely cooked, and that you properly wash your hands before you sit down to eat or put your fingers in your mouth. It’s just that simple, and it takes mere seconds to prevent.

Originally posted 2009-01-17 20:36:27. Republished by Old Post Promoter