| Windows Picture And Fax Viewer |
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Windows Picture and Fax Viewer is an Image Viewer . It is a part of the Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 Operating System s. It is capable of viewing JPG , PNG , BMP , GIF , WMF and TIF format files. Apart from its rudimentary image rotating tool, and its TIFF annotation feature, the ''Windows Picture and Fax Viewer'' only views, and does not edit images. It is a colour-managed application which recognizes embeded ICC colour profiles in JPG and TIFF files. ''Windows XP'' contains other programs that are capable of elementary Image Editing , such as Microsoft Paint . VIEWER CAPABILITIES The viewer is capabable of displaying all images listed above. If an image is larger than screen resolution, it is made to fit the screen. The viewer has an option to view the image full size, but scrolling is necessary to see all areas of the image. Shown below is a Screenshot of the ''Windows Picture and Fax Viewer’s'' Toolbar . AVAILABLE FEATURES The following features are available by selecting the applicable Toolbar icon:
SPECIAL HANDLING OF TIFF FILES If a TIFF formatted file is opened in ''Windows Picture and Fax Viewer'', a new toolbar will appear at the bottom of the screen. This toolbar has icons that allow other operations to be performed. Lines can be drawn on the image and text added to it. Areas of the image can be selected and concealed. CONVENIENCE OF USE ''Windows Picture and Fax Viewer'' is very convenient for viewing all images associated with it. The user can view each image in the selected image folder in rapid succession, forward, or backward (slower) utilizing the arrow icons on the toolbar. Whilst an image is being viewed, two very useful options are available by right clicking inside the window.
CRITICISM The viewer is known to at times not render PNG images correctly. Even at a 100% zoom level, it sometimes causes entire lines to not be rendered, which can be very confusing when examining critical image data. A Buffer Overflow vulnerability has been found in the underlying graphics rendering engine that the viewer uses, which could allow an attacker to execute code remotely by getting the user to view a specially crafted WMF file. Microsoft released a patch for this vulnerability in January 2006; their bulletin also states that a valid workaround is to disable the viewer via the registry. See Windows Metafile Vulnerability . The viewer is the default viewer for many file types in Windows XP, and there appears to be no interface to choose a different viewer program for these file types. The only workaround appears to be to disable the viewer entirely, if a user wanted to make a different viewer the default for these file types. {Link without Title} MEANS OF DISABLING Because the viewer is part of the Windows operating system, it cannot easily be completely removed. However, Microsoft has provided instructions for disabling it, as a possible workaround for a security issue. : Unregister the Windows Picture and Fax Viewer (Shimgvw.dll) on Windows XP Service Pack 1; Windows XP Service Pack 2; Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 : Microsoft has tested the following workaround. While this workaround will not correct the underlying vulnerability, it helps block known attack vectors. When a workaround reduces functionality, it is identified in the following section. : Note This workaround is intended to help protect against Web based exploit vectors and is not effective against exploits that have Windows Metafile images embedded in Word documents and other similar attack vectors. : Note The following steps require Administrative privileges. We recommend that you restart the computer after you apply this workaround. Alternatively, you can log out and log back in after you apply the workaround. However, we do recommend that you restart the computer. : To un-register Shimgvw.dll, follow these steps: : 1. Click Start, click '''Run''', type "'''regsvr32 -u %windir%\system32\shimgvw.dll'''" (without the quotation marks), and then click '''OK'''. : 2. When a dialog box appears that confirms that the process has been successful, click OK. : Impact of Workaround: The Windows Picture and Fax Viewer will no longer start when users click a link to an image type that is associated with the Windows Picture and Fax Viewer. : To undo this workaround after the security update has been deployed, reregister Shimgvw.dll. To do this, use this same procedure, but replace the text in step 1 with “regsvr32 %windir%\system32\shimgvw.dll” (without the quotation marks). SEE ALSO EXTERNAL LINKS
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