Task List
Name

PROGRAM &
MANUFACTURER

WHAT IT IS
AND WHAT YOU CAN DO

Ocraware

Ocrawr32

OCRAware.exe

OCRAwr32.exe

(Caere OmniPage – ScanSoft)

These two background programs implement the OCR Aware feature of OmniPage in the later versions of OmniPage (this is called OmniPage/OCR Aware in other versions of OmniPage).  This feature inserts the Acquire Text option in the File menu of Office Suites (Microsoft Office, Lotus SmartSuite, Corel WordPerfect).  By clicking on "Acquire Text" you can scan a page of text and have it OCR’ed by OmniPage straight into your wordprocessor, spreadsheet, or presentation, all in one operation. When it works it is a great feature and a much simpler operation than opening OmniPage, scanning, converting, and saving into a file.

Recommendation : 
Unfortunately there are many documented conflicts between these background programs and other applications such as applications using your modem (!!), or other applications which need to use the scanner.  Our recommendation, therefore, is that, unless you do a lot of conversion-to-text scanning (OCR) and you are not experiencing general PC problems or problems with other programs, then you should disable this feature and get used to manually opening OmniPage to scan text. You can disable the feature as follows :
(1) Open OmniPage.
(2) Choose the "Tools \ OCR Aware" menu option.
(3) Remove the check mark against the "Enable OCR Aware" option.
OneTouchMon

OneTouchMonitor		 OneTouchMonitor.exe

(Visioneer Inc.)		 System Tray icon which enables the user to access from the System Tray the control buttons on the front panel of the scanner.

Recommendation :
This background task sometimes interferes either with printing or with the ability of your PC to communicate with your printer.  If that should happen, disable it with Startup Manager.

Onflow

Onflow.exe

(Onflow Corp.)

Onflow is a Web Advertising tool from Onflow Corporation.

Recommendation :
If you downloaded Onflow simply to evaluate it and you are no longer using it, uninstall it via "Add/Remove Programs" in the Control Panel.

Opware16

Opware32

Opware16.exe

Opware32.exe

(Caere OmniPage – ScanSoft)

These two background programs implement the OmniPage Aware feature of OmniPage in specific versions of OmniPage (this is called OCR Aware in other versions of OmniPage).  This feature inserts the Acquire Text option in the File menu of Office Suites (Microsoft Office, Lotus SmartSuite, Corel WordPerfect).  By clicking on "Acquire Text" you can scan a page of text and have it OCR’ed by OmniPage straight into your wordprocessor, spreadsheet, or presentation, all in one operation. When it works it is a great feature and a much simpler operation than opening OmniPage, scanning, converting, and saving into a file.

Recommendation : 
Unfortunately there are many documented conflicts between these background programs and other applications such as applications using your modem (!!), or other applications which need to use the scanner.  Our recommendation, therefore, is that, unless you do a lot of conversion-to-text scanning (OCR) and you are not experiencing general PC problems or problems with other programs, then you should disable this feature and get used to manually opening OmniPage to scan text. You can disable the feature as follows :
(1) Open OmniPage.
(2) Choose the "Tools \ Options" menu option.
(3) Choose the "OCR Aware" tab.
(4) Remove the check mark against the "Enable OCR Aware" option.

Osa

Osa9

OSA.exe

OSA9.exe

(Microsoft)

Microsoft Office’s Office Startup Application. Present in Microsoft Office 97, 2000, and XP where it is called OSA9.EXE.  According to Microsoft, OSA enables Microsoft Office programs to start faster.  It is our view, however, that most Microsoft background programs whose purpose is to enable you to "do something" faster, are a total utter waste of time and, worse, they also sometimes have extremely irritating side-effects which completely negate their supposed benefits (such as the annoying and infamous FindFast).

Recommendation : 
Delete or disable using Startup Manager.
Osd OSD.exe

(Netropa Corp)		 Netropa’s OnScreen Display System Tray icon which comes installed on a number of blue-chip manufacturers’ PCs, such as DELL, Compaq, HP, IBM, Acer. etc...  If you right-click on the icon you can change the colour or font of your display, and you can also modify other display settings.

Recommendation :
This icon simply adds to the clutter of the system tray – it adds nothing that you cannot do by going into the Display Settings in the Control Panel.  Worse, OSD interferes with games which change the volume during the game, it has significant compatibility problems with some graphics drivers, and it causes some screen savers to crash.  Delete immediately in Startup Manager.
Ossproxy OssProxy.exe

(Netsetter / Marketscore)		 Software which gets installed on your PC when you install the Internet Acceleration software from Marketscore (previously Netsetter).  Note that you may have installed Marketscore unwittingly while installing other software.

Recommendation :
There are doubts as to whether this Internet acceleration really works – in our opinion, if you have a DSL/ADSL or Cable Modem connection, then you do not need this type of service.  Most importantly, read your Marketscore License Agreement – if you do not like what you read in it, de-install the service and software.  To remove in Windows 9x/ME, do "Start \ Run" and type "C:\Windows\System\NSCheck /uninstall". To remove in Windows NT4/2000/XP do "Start \ Run" and type NSCheck /uninstall.