A few days ago, Jason Cowart of ITS sent out the following notice:
- The majority of the problems we've had reported with Sophos installations revolved around the installer's attempt to remove previous anti-malware software on the Windows platform. To help users resolve these issues we made some changes to the installer to do a couple of additional things:
- If there was a problem removing a previous software package the installer will indicate which software it detected and couldn't remove. It will instruct the user to try to remove this software from the Add/Remove Programs Control Panel and then to try running the installer again. It will also give them an easy shortcut to open that Control Panel.
- If the installer runs into any problems it will collect a variety of log files and place them together in a file named SophosLogs.txt that it will place on the desktop where the user can easily find it to email to a support representative.
- A few weeks ago we made Sophos Anti-Virus available via Stanford Desktop Tools. This week we made it an "Urgent" update so SDT should prompt users more visibly about needing to install it (and remove Symantec/Norton in the process).
- The campus-wide license of Symantec Antivirus expired at the end of September. While a limited number of licenses were obtained for certain departments who are using the Symantec server product and needed more time to transition, those running the standalone desktop version (the great majority) are now running an unlicensed version. Those with Symantec/Norton installed will continue to receive updates to virus definitions, but will not be able to get updates to the application itself. For this reason, departments and workgroups should be making plans to replace Symantec with Sophos as soon as possible.
If you have any questions about Sophos or the rollout effort please submit a HelpSU Request (http://helpsu.stanford.edu/?pcat=ESS).
I have an old Dell laptop (Inspirion 5150, P4, 512MB RAM, 40GB HD) at home for personal use that I also use to check email and even occasionally do some work. It used to live on campus, and it had the Stanford Norton Anti-virus, so I thought I would just install Sophos (on http://ess.stanford.edu).
However, while it did a good job of getting rid of Norton, I got an error saying that it was unable to install Sophos. This happened over and over, so I sent in a helpsu and eventually brought the machine in so that someone from Academic Computing could look at it. She ran through all the steps of re-installing Norton, changing the settings, then uninstalling and running CCcleaner (http://www.ccleaner.com/), but nothing worked. In the end she said that, while they had encountered problems before, mine was the first case that they had where they were not able to install Sophos. She suggested that I go to see the folks at ITS, but I felt like I didn't want to invest any more time in the project, so I just downloaded Microsoft Live OneCare for a trial run. And it seems to be working very nicely - especially after getting the system cleaned out like that.
Instructors who have similar problems installing Sophos should submit a helpsu or contact the Language Center CRC representative directly.