Microsoft Disabling DAV Protocol from 30-June-2008

An important mail from Microsoft which I thought of sharing with all -

"Dear Microsoft Outlook Express customer,

Thank you for using Microsoft® Outlook® Express. Our information indicates that you use Outlook Express to access a Windows Live™ Hotmail® e-mail account via a protocol called DAV (Distributed Authoring and Versioning protocol). DAV, like POP3 or IMAP, is the way that a mail client communicates with a web-based mail server.

As a valued customer, we want to provide advanced notice that as of June 30, 2008, Microsoft is disabling the DAV protocol and you will no longer be able to access your Hotmail Inbox via Outlook Express. As an alternative, we recommend that you download Windows Live Mail, a free desktop e-mail client that has the familiarity of Outlook Express and much more. This next generation of free e-mail software will allow you to easily manage multiple e-mail accounts—including Windows Live Hotmail, plus other e-mail accounts that support POP3/IMAP. Better yet, Windows Live Mail integrates well with other Windows Live services, and downloads in minutes. After you provide your user name and password, you will automatically be linked to your Hotmail account, providing continued access to your email and contacts.

We encourage you to download Windows Live Mail at http://get.live.com/wlmail/overview.

And, to make your transition smoother, we've provided answers to frequently asked questions below.

Again, thank you for your use of Outlook Express and we are confident that you'll be just as delighted with the new Windows Live Mail.

Your Windows Live Mail team

Frequently asked questions:

Why are we disabling DAV?

DAV is a legacy protocol that is not well suited for client access to large inboxes. Over time, as we've provided more e-mail storage to our users—and now offer 5GB inboxes for free—a more efficient access protocol is needed.

What are we replacing DAV with?

We have developed a new, much more efficient protocol called DeltaSynch that is far superior to DAV especially for large e-mail inboxes. It enables email clients to only download changes since the last time the client polled the email server for changes. This is much more efficient and high performing than having to download all the headers in every folder as is the case with DAV.

Is DeltaSynch compatible with Outlook Express?

The new protocol unfortunately is NOT supported by Outlook Express and support would require too many changes to the Outlook Express software.

Is there a different or new mail client I can try that uses DeltaSynch?

Microsoft is providing Windows Live Mail, a free e-mail client that has the familiarity of Outlook Express and much more. This free, next generation email client enables users to easily manage multiple e-mail accounts including Windows Live Hotmail and other e-mail accounts that support POP3/IMAP. Windows Live Mail also integrates well with other Windows Live services, is optimized to work with Windows Live Hotmail, and offers:

• Offline mail
• Windows Live Hotmail account aggregation for those users with multiple Hotmail accounts
• Account aggregation for POP and IMAP mail accounts
• Rich photo-sharing capabilities
• Advanced search via integration with Desktop Search
• Safety tools (Anti-Virus scanning, anti-phishing, anti-spam features across aggregated accounts for customers who do not have an Anti-Virus product)
• Integration with Windows Live services including Windows Live Spaces
• RSS (Real Simple Syndication) feed aggregation
• Ability to send SMS (short message service) text to a mobile phone from Windows Live Mail

Where can I download the new Windows Live Mail client?

You can download the new client at http://get.live.com/wlmail/overview.

Microsoft respects your privacy. To learn more, please read our online Privacy Statement.

Microsoft Corporation, One Microsoft Way, Redmond, WA 98052"

SIP-enabled Instant Messenger

I just visited a site http://www.gtalk2voip.com & found out very useful services offered by this company. With the growing popularity of VOIP, SIP has almost become a defacto standard.

With the help of this site you can easily SIP-enable your very popular Instant Messengers like MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, Google Talk, etc.

Some benefits which I have found after a little bit of tweaking -

1. You can call up any registered VOIP number on the internet from your Instant Messenger.
2. You can register a free SIP number with any service provider & associate the same with your IM client. Your IM client will thus act as a SIP softphone & you would thus not require to install another SIP softphone.
3. You can call US Toll Free numbers right from your IM client.

There are various other interesting features available. To explore these features just send an invitation mail to your MSN/Yahoo/Google ID from the site www.gtalk2voip.com & accept the invitation that you receive from this site.

Some of the features currently provided are -

Gtalk2VoIP: Welcome to GTalk2VoIP - Free Voice Gateway for Google Talk, MSN, Yahoo!, AIM, ICQ and iChat

Type 'HELP' for more information

You entered: HELP

.
*====== AVAILABLE COMMANDS ======*
HELP - Display this message.
MYPAGE - Display URL to your personal account page.
WEBCALL - Display URL to your personal Web Call.
DICT word - Make a request to DICT.ORG for word definitions.
MSG to text - Send off-line message text to user to .
IM to text - Send Instant Message text to user to . Example: IM msn:billgates@hotmail.com Hello Billy!

VMLIST - Display content of your voice mail box.
VMPLAY id - Play voice mail message number id .
VMDEL id - Delete voice mail message number id
VMSEND user - Send voice mail to other gtalk user .
VMSET id - Set id as a default welcome message.
CONF - Create conference room for you. Room cookie will be sent back.
JOIN cookie - Join someone's else conference room using cookie .

COST phone - Display amount of credits charged for 1min unit while calling to phone . Example, to figure price for calling american 800 services type: COST 1-800
CREDITS - Go buy more credits.
CALL phone [via] - Make an outgoing voice call to telephone number phone which is represented in E.164 format. Example, to call Google type: CALL 1-650-253-0000 . You can also setup a registered service provider name in optional via parameter to place call throu.
CALL sipuser@sipprovider.com - Make an outgoing voice call to SIP phone sipuser@sipprovider.com . Example: CALL pbx@stalker.com .
DTMF_TONES : Type in any string of digits or Asterisk or # sign while talking to send DTMF tones.
SMS phone_number text - Send text an SMS message to phone . Example: SMS +1-234-5678901 Hello, just testing
*============== END =============*

The information above has been pulled by using the keyword HELP.

करलो दुनिया मुट्ठी में।

Tax Planning

For people having CTC over Rs. 6-6.5 Lakhs per annum & having a Floating Rate Housing Loan, the investment pattern suggested below would be quite useful.

Tips -

• Section 80C - (Max: Rs.1,00,000 for Males)

1. Check the Prinicpal component of your housing loan from the Provisional Tax Statement provided by your Housing loan provider. Let your Principle component be around Rs.70-80,000 per year. If you find it less, use an Amortization Chart & redesign your EMI.
2. Let your life insurance policy premium not exceed Rs.10-15,000 per year.
3. Leave the balance Rs.10,000 amount in the beginning of the year, so that if the interest rate on Housing loan changes, you can utilize this buffer amount. Remember, if the interest rate increases, the Principle component would decrease & Interest component would increase. And if the interest rate decreases, it would be vice versa.
4. In case of increase in interest rate, you can do a part pre-payment of your Principle component for the balance amount in Section 80C (max investment of Rs.1,00,000 for males). Before re-designing your EMI at the beginning of the year you have to do a what-if analysis of interest rates depending on market trends. (NOTE: It is beyond the scope of this article to explain in complete detail of doing a what-if analysis within an amortization chart)

• Section 24D - (Max: Rs,1,50,000)

1. This section would cover the Interest commponent of your housing loan & the investments here would vary based on interest rate changes. As already mentioned above you need to do a what-if analysis within the amortization chart which would give you maximum benefit under Section 80C & Section 24D.

• Section 80D - (Max: Rs.15,000 [Rs.20,000 for Senior Citizens])

1. Buy a Health Insurance Policy depending on whether you have Dependant Senior Citizens in your family. Go for a health insurance policy which gives you benefit of both Domiciliary & Hospitalization claims. With a premium of around Rs.20,000, you get domiciliary claim limit of around Rs.50,000 approximately & hospitalization coverage of around Rs.1-1.5 Lakhs.
2. With domiciliary claims you can claim the day to day doctors' expenses you incur on yours & your dependents' treatment (Medication for fever, etc.). This includes claims for both the Doctors' fees as well as medicines.

• Section 10 - (Max: Rs.15,000)

1. You could claim tax benefits on Medical Bills (day to day expenses) mentioned in the previous section.

• Food Coupons - (Max: Rs.30,000)

1. If your employer provides you the option to take part of the Salary as Food Coupons, do go for it, as you could do grocery purchases at many famous outlets using these food coupons. You can also use these food coupons at various hotels when you go out for partying.

There are various other options available for Tax Planning & this was just a small suggestion from my end to help you in saving more from you.

(DISCLAIMER: I am not a Tax Consultant. Please do your Tax & Investment planning after thorough study & guidance from a qualified Financial Consultant).

Safeguarding your Credit Cards

"Rs.60,000 gone in a day"....thats what I heard from one of my colleagues when I entered office today. How ? Someone had used his Credit Card details to buy Airline tickets worth Rs.60,000.

He first summoned me & asked if our Office network was secure, as I am a Security Consultant. Later on, after a few rounds of discussions we suspected that someone probably had jotted down his Card No., Expiry Date & CVV in some Hotel or other location where he had used his card. It reminds me of the famous Security statement - "Security is like a chain & its total strength is equal to the strength at its weakest point". In todays tech-savvy world there are 2 weak points - the Internet & not to forget, the vulnerable HUMAN CHAIN.

So how to keep your Credit Card secure -

1. Whenever you handover your Credit Card at any outlet, make sure that the executive is not noting down the Card details.
   
2. Keep a regular check on your Card transactions by checking online. This will prevent any misuse of your Card. Don't worry, online transactions are still pretty safe & secure provided you have logged on to a secure site (i.e. httpS://*.*) of a genuine company.
   
3. Do not make transactions until & unless the site is a Secure site. Do ensure that the site being accessed is not a Phished site. Banking firms & various other companies regularly sent mailers to customers on how to check whether the site is a genuine site.
   
4. Nowadays many Banks also provide one time use Virtual Credit Cards that can be created by you for online transactions.
   
5. As a best practice, memorize your CVV code & scribble the same behind your Card.
6. Close your unused Credit Cards & physically destroy them.
   

A little bit of technical / financial know how & keeping yourself updated with the latest happenings around you will keep your Credit Cards safe & secure.