December 1, 1997
New Norton Utilities should help decrease down time
By Bob O'Donnell
One of the greatest myths of our age is that computers save time and make people more
productive. Of course, PCs certainly enable people to do things that they couldn't do
before. Now, I realize that this may sound like sacrilege, but anyone who spends serious
time with PCs knows that they aren't really increasing our overall output. The truth is,
they take up a lot of what could be productive time.
Part of the reason for this is that computers' capabilities make us more ambitious,
eager to take on a project or reach a level of perfection that we could never have
achieved without them. But at issue is the fact that we have to regularly fix problems
that develop on our machines. If all of our time in front of computers were completely
trouble-free, they probably would be productivity-boosters. But that day is a long way
off.
The reasons for down time are numerous and well covered: incompatible software, poorly
designed and documented software, levels of complexity that baffle even the most expert
users, and lots more. Lots of companies are working on products that attempt to address
some of these issues and increase the amount of productive time we spend in front of our
computers. One of the most recent efforts is the latest version of Symantec's Norton
Utilities for Windows 95 and NT 4.0. (See "Norton
Utilities is a solid troubleshooter" for a full product review.)
I've been a long-time fan and user of NU, both on Macs and PCs, so I admit to being a
tad biased. But I'm intrigued by the new WinDoctor utility Symantec has included in the
most recent version. The concept behind WinDoctor is that it will try to fix your Windows
System files and applications in the same way that the excellent DiskDoctor utility
monitors and repairs your hard disk. Given the amount of time that IS managers and
help-desk staffs spend trying to fix problems that revolve around these issues, I think
this could be a real time-saver in most business environments. (Frankly, it seems somehow
criminal that we have to add a utility or other program just to fix problems with all the
other software on our machines. But such is the state of Windows-based personal computers
in 1997.)
Much of what WinDoctor does can be boiled down to searching through the Windows
Registry and application files to see which DLLs and other shared files are required to
run and then making sure those files are found in the appropriate place on your hard disk.
If they aren't there, the program attempts to fix the problem by reinstalling the missing
files. The idea sounds fantastic, but it only works if the missing DLL was accidentally
deleted or removed by a sloppy uninstaller and is sitting in the Norton Protected Recycle
Bin. If it's been corrupted and/or completely erased, all WinDoctor can do is tell you
that the missing file needs to be reinstalled. Fair enough, except that finding a missing
DLL or other single file on an application disk that may use compressed or otherwise
nonreadable files isn't any easier than it used to be. Still, at least you'll know for
sure what's causing problems with your application.
The program's new Live Update Pro feature -- which, like CyberMedia's Oil Change, goes
out to the Web to find updates or patches for all your applications and drivers and
downloads them for you -- should also help solve lots of problems. The increasing number
of incompatibilities that seem to be occurring as a result of one product update breaking
another program makes this kind of functionality really important.
Ultimately, what really matters is how many of the hassles a product like this can
remove from our day-to-day computing experience. In that regard, I'm hoping that Norton
Utilities 3.0 actually proves to be a real time-saver over the long haul. Who knows, maybe
it'll even make me more productive.
©
Copyright 1997, by InfoWorld Publishing Corp., a
subsidiary of IDG Communications, Inc. Reprinted from InfoWorld,
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