[K-Man]

Okay; you can feel free to tell me if this is a stupid suggestion.

The Security forum is easily the busiest here at TSG. (imagine that ) However; I believe it might benefit from being divided into two forums: one for "need help!" type threads --- and one for general security questions.

The problem I see is twofold:

1. Urgent requests for help are, properly, given priority over general questions... but these threads must stay near the top of the list to get noticed... and newly posted general questions will bump them down.

2. General security questions are certainly valid, but are in the opposite situation of the urgent requests for help. Once posted; a general question may go unanswered, because it is listed with the help requests, which again, are properly given more urgent attention.

Both these catagories of threads are valid, but are probably answered most often by different types of users. I believe it would benefit both catagories if they could be separated as 'sub-forums' under the general 'security' title.

That's about it. What do you think? (Be nice now...)

[K-Man]

Was this a dumb suggestion?

[K-Man]

This will teach me not to compete with the Tech Guy! LOL

[hewee]

He hee stupid or dumb or maybe just no one said anything.

[Rollin' Rog]

It's not a dumb suggestion, and many forums do just that.

My objection to it is that when forums get subdivided questions actually get fewer "reads" because folks tend to gravitate to one or the other rather than load and scroll through multiple forums.

Many questions get answered simply because someone with a problem in one area happens to have the forum loaded and see a topic question on which they have some personal interest, experience or input to offer. And visa versa, they may find themselves checking out and learning more about different subjects as well. Forum specialization tends to work against this kind of interaction.

[Rockn]

It might not be a bad idea to seperate out the HJT log postings as they seem to take up about 90% of the entire Security section.

[smeegle]

K-man, I don't think your idea of a sub-forum was a stupid suggestion. Which brings up Rockn's idea of separating out the HJT logs, we had a poll about that but it seemed to have died because of lack of interest.

[K-Man]

Hmm... I've thought the same thing about the HJT logs, but then, these logs seem like the #1 tool for people who are really in deep... um... doodoo.

(It amazes me how people can have dozens of spywares and such. I guess I don't have the surfing habits of most people.)

Another thought I had on the whole HJT thing:

It would be kinda cool to have a FAQ for HJT stuff. I've learned a bit about interpreting the logs, just by browsing the threads.

One other question though:

I've notice that the problems in these HJT logs are often in the form of URLs. Well; whenever these logs are posted, those URLs become active links! I'd hate to think what might happen if someone clicked on one of them! Is this a real danger, or am I just not understanding this correctly?

[hewee]

Yea there are other forums now that have HijackThis forums.

They did so here.

http://forums.net-integration.net/in...p?showforum=62

[K-Man]

Originally Posted by Rollin' Rog

My objection to it is that when forums get subdivided questions actually get fewer "reads" because folks tend to gravitate to one or the other rather than load and scroll through multiple forums.

Many questions get answered simply because someone with a problem in one area happens to have the forum loaded and see a topic question on which they have some personal interest, experience or input to offer. And visa versa, they may find themselves checking out and learning more about different subjects as well. Forum specialization tends to work against this kind of interaction.

Yeah; I think I see what you mean.

My original thought was to just add a completely new forum... something like "Emergency! 911!" Basically; a forum specifically for those who have a very immediate problem, such as being hijacked.

The whole reason I thought of this, is because I've had to post fairly often in the security forum myself, but pretty much always because I'm just new to security software, and need help to understand how it works, or if it even is working.

I always feel bad about 'bumping' down the real emergency cases though. Then, when my own thread ends up on page 3 in like a half an hour, I get frustrated, because I do want an answer... but I don't want to bump the other threads... but I do want an answer... but.. ad infinitum.

See what I'm saying?

[smeegle]

Sometimes it has to do with timing, K-man. If you'll notice, certain individuals with particular expertise seem to answer threads at certain times of day. If you take notice of their patterns you'll know when to post your question and then perhaps get their attention.

[hewee]

Look here at this.

http://www.fbeej.dk/NewHJTEntries.htm

[K-Man]

Wow! That's a lot of HJT info!

Looks like a very useful link hewee!

[hewee]

Your welcome K-man

Here are some others.

http://www.help2go.com/article153.html

http://aumha.org/a/hjttutor.php

http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/htlogtutorial.html

http://forums.spywareinfo.com/index.php?showtopic=10503

http://hometown.aol.co.uk/jrmc137/hj...l/tutorial.htm

HijackThis log file analysis
http://www.hijackthis.de/index.php?langselect=english
Note this is not all that good from what the ones that know how to read the logs.
See this thread. http://forums.techguy.org/t284466.html

[K-Man]

You're just a link finding machine there hewee!

I copied all the URLs to a notepad text file, so i can wade through them later.

(I love notepad!)