We have just finished a new comparison test of AV software. All products (in the “best” available Security Suite edition) were last updated on January 7, 2008 and tested on Windows XP SP2 (English).

 

    First, we checked the signature-based on-demand detection of all products against more than 1 Mio. samples we’ve found spreading or which were distributed during the last six months (this means, we have not used any “historic” samples.) We included all malware categories in the test: Trojan Horses, backdoors, bots, worm and viruses. Instead of just presenting the results, we have ranked the product this time, from “very good” (++) if the scanner detected more than 98% of the samples to “poor” (–) when less than 85% of the malware was detected.

 

    Secondly, we checked the number of false positives of the products have generated during a scan of 65,000 known clean files. Only products with no false positives received a “very good” (++) rating.

 

    In case of the proactive detection category, we have not only focussed on signature- and heuristic-based proactive detection only (based on a retrospective test approach with a one week old scanner).

 

    Instead of this, we also checked the quality of the included behavior based guard (e.g. Deepguard in case of F-Secure and TruPrevent in case of Panda). We used 3,500 samples for the retrospective test as well as 20 active samples for the test of the “Dynamic Detection” (and blocking) of malware.

 

    Furthermore, we checked how long AV companies usually need to react in case of new, widespread malware (read: outbreaks), based on 55 different samples from the entire year 2007. “Very good” (++) AV product developers should be able to react within less than two hours.

 

    Another interesting test was the detection of active rootkit samples. While it’s trivial for a scanner to detect inactive rootkits using a signature, it can be really tricky to detect this nasty malware when they are active and hidden. We checked the scanner’s detection against 12 active rootkits.

 

Having such a multi-faceted test methodology is important — an antivirus engine could, for example, have extraordinarily high detection, but high false positives. And, a retrospective test allows you to see how well an antivirus’ heuristics work. It’s good to look at all the parameters in order to judge efficacy.

 

I’ve put the test results into PDF. You can see the main results here and the details of the test of signature detection here.

 

 

 

Top 7 Weblog/Blog Software Tools

 

By Jennifer Kyrnin, About.com

Filed In:

 

   1. Web Design / HTML

 

Weblogs or “blogs” are an easy way to get content up on the Web. Using templates, you can post to the blog quickly without knowing HTML, CSS, or design. They also offer tools like comments, automatic RSS feed generation, and much more. Using blog software to manage your Web site is a smart move for anyone who wants to handle a lot of regularly updating content.

 

Blogs are one of the simplest examples of content management, as they take basic content and do things like add HTML tags and hyperlink URLs so you don’t have to. With this software, you’ll have your blog up and running in a matter of minutes.

 

Movable Type

 

MovableType is the blog I have chosen for my own use. It is a publishing system that you run on your own Web server. It can be difficult to install, but once you have it up and running, you’ll find it fabulous. There is a free (for non-commercial use) version of the tool, with all the features you expect from blogging software: templates, uploading images, publicity features, pre- and post-date entries, and more.

Publisher’s Site

WordPress

 

WordPress is a publishing platform that relies on PHP and a database to make your blog entries load quickly and update immediately. I love the password protected posts feature, and it was really easy to install and use. My big issue with it is that it doesn’t easily support multiple blogs without multiple installations.

Publisher’s Site

Lyceum

 

Lyceum is a multi-user multi-blog application based on the WordPress platform. In a nutshell, it is WordPress with a few enhancements. If you like WordPress, but want to host more than one blog on your server, this is a good choice.

Publisher’s Site

Blogger

 

Blogger is one of the easiest Weblog tools available. It takes about 5 minutes to sign up for a Blogger account, you get a tool for writing your blog, space on the Blogger server if you need it, and built-in templates so your pages have style right out of the box.

Publisher’s Site

TypePad

 

TypePad is the online version of MovableType. It gives you all the features that we’ve come to expect from MT, but in a hosted option where you don’t have to worry about maintaining the software.

Publisher’s Site

Greymatter

 

Greymatter is another blog that you host yourself. I favor these types of tools because they are more secure with your passwords, and often offer more flexibility. Greymatter lives up to this as “the original opensource weblogging software”. If you’re looking for a no nonsense Weblog tool with lots of features, this is where to start. I had it installed on my Web server in about 30 minutes.

Publisher’s Site

Radio Userland

 

Radio has one thing that no other blog tool I reviewed had - an actual desktop tool for creating your blog. Radio offers all the features of your typical online Weblog, including promotion and linking, but the software runs on your desktop. And if you need to post and you’re away from your computer, you can even use email to post a message to your blog. The cost is reasonable for the feature set.