:)Hi,
Until three months ago, I didn’t know what a gif is; now I have a folder full of them that I have thought worthy, some animated. When I “save picture as”, can any kind of malware be attached to the gif ? If so, what procedure should I use to prevent it?
Thank you — 
Sojourner
Hi Sojourner,
I have one very fast rule. If I download something it get’s scanned. Either as a by product of the download manager or, I rightclick on the file and select the afor an on-demand scan of either the file or the folder.
But that’s my personal regiment.
:)I agree; the thing that bothers me is that the gif is already on this computer sitting in the open, not like other things that are saved and before opening, you can click to scan. When you scan the gif, let’s say it has some sort of malware attached to it - it’s already had time to do whatever it was supposed to do; I thought maybe there is a way to contain this type of saved object until it can be scanned. Am I being clear?
Maybe malware can’t ride on gifs anyway.
Thank you, Bob–
Sojourner
I don’t remember ever hearing of a virus attached to a .gif file. GIFs are not executable files - they have to be loaded and interpretted by the corresponding viewer program. I think you don’t have to worry about them.
There is a way to put code into a image file. The image will be shown to the normal user and the code can contain anything, but can only been seen if you use a special application to “extract” the code for it. Police and criminals have used this method to communicate with eachother. But up to now, there was never any code in it that could be harmfull. Simply because the code inside is not executed. In order for harmfull code to become active/do damage it has to be executed in some way. I’m pretty sure that it is impossible to put any harmfull code in a image file and let it become active if there is no application (or other thing) that activates the code. So image files should be safe now and in the future.
Hi Igor and Eddy,
Thank you for your replies! And it’s good to know I can search and save gifs without a worry! I just wish it wasn’t so hard to find good ones in the masses of silly, ugly, and hyperactive ones! 
I had decided my question was a dumb one, but now I am glad I asked.
Sojourner
It is normally not hard to find what you are looking for. You just have to know how to search. That is the trick 
For images you may want to try [urlhttp://www.google.nl/imghp?hl=en&tab=wi&q=]this[/url] site
And this one may be of help also.
And remember, there is nothing else that takes so much time as learning ;D
Hi Eddy,
Am I supposed to be able to log on to those links? They are dead! Can you check them for me?
Thank you!
Sojourner
The second one is live.
And this one may be of help also.Look at his post and click on the word this Unfortunately you'll have to wait for Eddy on the first one. Hope that helps.
Thanks, Bob —
I wasn’t sharp enough for that one! I just thought he forgot to include the URL, like some people do!
Hi Again Sojourner
Here is what I was taught about posting Meaningful Links:
You need to choose your URL path and contain it in the opening and closing URL tags, change the ] in the opening tag to an = and place the ] (that you replaced) at the end of the url path.
This now gives a ][ next to one and other, your Meaningfull Text goes between these.
Example:
[ url=http://forum.avast.com/index.php?board=1;action=display;threadid=1509 ]Links Thread[ /url ] If you remove the space after the[ and, the space after1509 and, the space after the [ and the space after /url the result is the Meaningful Link below. (hope you can follow all of this) You might want to keep this as a reference.
Well Bob, it’s possible that after a good night’s sleep, I might be able to get it — I will save it — and we’ll see.
Thank you,
and good night —
Sojourner
PS, Bob —
How did you know I was dying to know how to do that?
Sojourner
Sojourner,
How did you know I was dying to know how to do that?Mind reading is a sidline. My fee is very reasonable. ;D