Archive for the ‘Tech’ Category:
Failed Windows Update Installations (Office 2007)
Update (Thurs. 3/11. 12:18am) : As of late Wednesday evening the page for “Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB977724)” appears to have been “taken down” by Microsoft. No word — that I can find — as to why. Possibly related to an error mentioned in the reader comments for this article.
Yesterday was Tuesday, and Tuesday is the day Microsoft typically issues the free Windows Updates to patch any security problems that have been discovered, fix flaws, remove malicious software (Windows Malicious Software Tool) and add new features.
Four of the six updates my computer downloaded for installation failed to install properly. These were all Microsoft Office 2007 updates:
- Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB977724)
- Security Update for Microsoft Office Excel 2007 (KB978382)
- Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB978380)
- Update for Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 Junk Email Filter (KB979895)
If you’ve had the same problem with these updates then you will have to manually download and install them. It’s not that difficult to do, and I’ll make it easier by providing you with links to Microsoft’s download pages for these updates. You’ll see two links on each line, but they both take you to the same page.
- Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB977724) – Filename: office-kb977724-fullfile-x86-glb.exe
- Security Update for Microsoft Office Excel 2007 (KB978382) - Filename: excel2007-kb978382-fullfile-x86-glb.exe
- Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB978380) - Filename: office2007-kb978380-fullfile-x86-glb.exe
- Update for Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 Junk Email Filter (KB979895) - Filename: office2007-kb979895-fullfile-x86-glb.exe
Download
Just click the links above to go to the appropriate download page, then click the “Download” button on each page. Choose the “Save” option, and save them to either your desktop, your documents folder, or your downloads folder. Anywhere you can easily find them later on. If you have to install them on more than one computer you might consider saving them to a flash drive.
Installation
Once you’ve downloaded them, you will need to run them as an administrator. You can’t do this with your typical double-click.
- Right-click on the file (point at the file, and click the right mouse button, not the left mouse button) and choose “Run as administrator” from the shortcut menu that appears.
- If the User Account Control dialog box appears — for you Windows Vista and Windows 7 users — asking “Do you want to allow the following program to make changes to your computer?”, click “Yes”.
- Click the checkbox to accept the Microsoft License Terms, then click “Continue”.
Repeat the process above for each of the downloaded files, and that’s it. Your updates should be properly installed at this time.
I wrote about a similar “Failed Windows Update Installations (Office 2007)” problem back in November 2009.
Subscribe to the comments for this postComputer generated lines on football broadcasts
I’ve often marvelled at the computer generated lines they draw across the fields in the football game broadcasts. Though not really expecting an answer, I’ve asked aloud during several broadcasts, “How do they do that? How do they draw those lines on the field.”
Inevitably, the answer comes back, simply, “With computers.”
Image from HowStuffWorks.com
“I know that, but how do they do it. Look! The lines don’t even cross over the players, it actually appears underneath them as if it were actually on the field.”
“I don’t know.”
That’s been the typical conversation all these years, and I’ve come no closer to getting an answer. (Strangely, I’ve never Googled to find an answer.) Until today.
I learned that the first time this was done was during a game between the Baltimore Ravens and the Cincinatti Bengals back in Sept. 27, 1998. (Bengals lost.) That is a long time to be wondering about this without ever investigating. I should probably be embarrassed.
Turns out Matt Lake of the New York Times published an article about this 10 years ago. The article is titled, “When the Game’s on the Line, the Line’s on the Screen”. In summary, this is how it’s done according to Matt Lake’s report:
- Surveying equipment is used to help create a 3-dimensional computer model of the football field. Each field being broadcast from needs it own model. A standard, generic model isn’t used.
- The video cameras used to broadcast the game have sensors that detect the cameras position and angle of view of the field including their zoom and focus settings.
- The raw video feed is received by a one of several computer graphics companies that specialize in handling the computer work for the broadcasts. They receive the feed just a few seconds before they broadcast goes over the air.
- The camera view information is matched against the computer generated model of the stadium. Then the field marker information is entered into the computer.
- The computer image is then overlaid over the video feed, but the computer work doesn’t end there. The grass color and lighting, adjusted for weather, needs to be matched so the computer image looks natural, but the computer needs to be informed of the teams colors so the image doesn’t cover the players. (That’s the part I always wondered about.)
So that, in a nutshell, is how it’s done. Amazingly, all this is done in about 3 seconds. The same technology is used to enter those little ads, which seem to be getting bigger, in the corners of the TV screens.
You can read Matt Lake’s New York Times article for the full story. There’s another article at HowStuffWorks.com, too.
Yahoo Email and Upgrading from Vista to Windows 7
I read this question online recently:
I am upgrading from Windows Vista to Windows 7. How do I back up my Yahoo! emails and do I need to do it?
If you have a free Yahoo! email account then there is no need to back up your emails because the emails are stored on Yahoo!’s servers and not your computer.
If you have a paid Yahoo! email account, called Yahoo! Mail Plus, which costs $19.99 per year, then it is possible that you could be downloading email messages to your computer with a program such as Outlook, Outlook Express, Windows Mail, Eudora, or some other program or email client.
Generally, when you are upgrading from Windows Vista to Windows 7 there is no need to erase your hard drive. When the hard drive is erased it is usually referred to as a “clean install”. While it’s always good idea to do a backup before an upgrade, it isn’t necessary. When upgrading from XP to Windows 7 the hard drive must be erased, so this is a case where it would be a good idea to have a backup of some sort.
Still, if you want to take the precaution of doing a backup, go to a computer store and get yourself an external USB drive such as a MyPassport from Western Digital and use the Windows Easy Transfer wizard to copy important files to the external drive. For more info on Windows Easy Transfer go here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-vista/features/easy-transfer.aspx
For more info on upgrading from Vista to Windows 7 go here: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/help/upgrading-from-windows-vista-to-windows-7
