Last year, ACC had a site license for McAfee VirusScan, so many of us have it on our computers. This year, ACC's license is with Norton AntiVirus. I understand that we are entitled to keep using the program from last year since we installed it when ACC had a license for it. For programs in general, this is not something that we have to think much about, but since we need to be updating our virus protection program regularly, we must be clear about all of this. For both of these programs, you may use their updating procedure, which is quite easy.

I have Windows 98 on my computer, so the method I am describing is appropriate for that. I believe it is the same as for Windows 95. I hope that some of us in the math department will be able to make similar information about how to do this for a Mac available soon.

From the main page, I go to the download page. Here I download the file with the latest virus definitions, which is an executable file. I have a subdirectory entitled "viruscheck". When I start to download the file, I make sure that I am putting it into that directory (so I can find it later). When I'm logged in through the network at school this download is pretty fast -- under 2 minutes. If I were doing it over a modem, it would be longer. After it is downloaded, then I close all the programs running and, from the "Start" menu, choose "Run". Then I "browse" to find my directory and the file that I just downloaded. When I find it, I run it. It handles all the updating that is needed. I understand that this updating doesn't take effect until the next time I boot the computer.

From the main page, I go to the download page. Then I do exactly the same thing I described in the McAfee section.

I know that both of these programs say that they will prompt you to update your virus protection program when it gets out of date. For some reason that I can't understand, that seems to not work very well on mine. When I respond to their prompt that I want to update, it doesn't always go all the way through and do it. Since I figured out to just go in regularly and get the files and do it myself, I don't have to worry about the fact that the automatic update mechanism isn't working.

Last updated July 3, 1999. Mary Parker