Technology

Dear Tech Support:

Last year I upgraded from Boyfriend 5.0 to Husband 1.0 and noticed that the new program began making unexpected changes to the accounting modules,limiting access to flower and jewelry applications that had operated flawlessly under Boyfriend 5.0. In addition,Husband 1.0 uninstalled many other valuable programs, such as Romance 9.9 but installed undesirable programs such as Cricket 5.0 and Formula 13.0.Conversation 8.0 no longer runs and Housecleaning 2.6 simply crashes the system. I've tried running Nagging 5.3 to fix these problems, but to no avail.

--Desperate

Dear Desperate,

Keep in mind, Boyfriend 5.0 is an entertainment package, while Husband 1.0 is an operating system.Try to enter the command: C:/ I THOUGHT YOU LOVED ME ; and install Tears 6.2. Husband 1.0 should then automatically run the applications: Guilty 3.0 and Flowers 7.0. But remember, overuse can cause Husband 1.0 to default to GrumpySilence 2.5,HappyHour 7.0 or Beer 6.1.Beer 6.1 is a very bad program that will create Snoring Loudly wave files.DO NOT install MotherInLaw 1.0 or reinstall another Boyfriend program. These are not supported applications and will crash Husband 1.0.In summary, Husband 1.0 is a great program, but it does have limited memory and cannot learn new applications quickly.Consider buying additional software to improve performance. I personally recommend Hot Food 3.0 and Lingerie 5.3. Also, running Nagging 5.3 too often can sometimes cause Husband 1.0 to secretly install Mistress 1.0, which would then require you to run Private Investigator 7.5 utility and possibly even Attorney 9.0, which could lead to a system wide failure and the need to reboot Husband 1.0.

Everybody clear on this now?

--Tech support.

Upgrading to Wife 1.0

Last a friend of mine upgraded from Girlfriend 4.0 to Wife 1.0 and found that it's memory hog leaving few system resources for other applications. He is now noticing the Wife 1.0 is also spawning Child-processes, which is further consuming valuable resources. No mention of this particular phenomenon was included in the product documentation, though other users have informed me that this is to be expected due to the nature of the application.

Not only that, Wife 1.0 installs itself so that it is always launched at system initialisation where it can monitor all other system activity. Some applications such as PokerNight 10.3, BachelorParty 2.5 and PubNight 7.0 are no longer able to run on the system at all, causing the system to lockup when launched (even though the apps worked fine before).Wife 1.0 provides no installation options. Thus, the installation of undesired plug-ins such as Mother-in-law 55.8 and the Brother-in-law Beta is unavoidable. Also system performance seems to diminish each passing day.Some features my friend would like to see in the upcoming Wife 2.0:

? A "don't remind me again button"

? Minimise button

? The ability to delete the "headache" file

? An install feature that provides an option to uninstall 2.0 version without loss of other system resources

An option to run the network driver in "promiscuous mode" allowing the systems hardware probe to be much more useful/effective.

I myself wish I had decided to avoid all of the headaches associated with Wife 1.0 by sticking with Girlfriend 3.0. Even here, however, I have found many problems. Apparently you cannot install Girlfriend 4.0. You must uninstall Girlfriend 3.0 first, otherwise the two versions of Girlfriend will have conflicts over shared use of the I/O port.Other users have told me that this is a long-standing problem that I should have been aware of. Guess that explains what happened to versions 1 & 2.To make matters worse, the uninstall program for Girlfriend 3.0 doesn't work very well, leaving undesirable traces of the application in the system. Another identified problem is that all versions of Girlfriend have annoying little messages about the advantages of upgrading to Wife 1.0.

VIRUS ALERT

All users should be aware that Wife 1.0 has an undocumented bug. If you try to install Mistress 1.1 before uninstalling Wife 1.0, Wife 1.0 will delete MS Money files before doing the uninstall itself. Once that happens, Mistress 1.1. won't install and you will get an "insufficient resources" error message. To avoid the aforementioned bug, try installing Mistress 1.1 on a different system and 'never' run any file transfer applications (such as Laplink) between the two systems.