"Interesting. Tell me how do you know " the versions of dotnet I need"? Is their a magic Windows dependency tool I don't know about?"
My method is easy. Just strip all the .NET mess out of the PC and then reboot. Wait and see what complains. Too many little applications come with the need of this huge mess of a framework.
Once .NET has gone, you can then see which programs complain. Then check up their specs as to what they need. (Or find replacements written in a proper language)
Trouble is, MAC addresses are easy to sniff and spoof if someone is determined to get in. Much safer to get to know your neighbours and then judge their technical abilities.
So... how did a debug version of a component with logging still enabled make its way into an Official Release? Don't they test these things before sending them out to the masses? How did something so simple and obvious get through?
I've been with them for almost a decade now. Have dozens of clients there too. Darn fine quality of hosting. Lots of different packages and options. Been almost trouble free in that time. The techs are helpful and fast to reply to tickets. The accounts department is intelligent and can deal with complex issues. NO off shore call centres scripts or buck passing - you talk to the people who actually run the company.
The two occasions that there has been a DDoS there was plenty of information pouring out of their Twitter feed. Honest descriptions of what was happening and how they were fixing it. See the UK2 story in today's news about the BS they are spinning with their DDoS attack and you soon realise how good it is to have an honest company to deal with.
And I would also put some extra votes down to avoid 1&1 and Fasthosts. Have have nothing but pain with those companies. Lots of BS from the support. Always had to migrate my clients away from them. Always beware of "cheap" hosting - you get what you pay for.
Vodaphone sure signal - if you change your router, they are get you to reply to an email to confirm you are still at the same address. Don't know how much deeper that goes as many IP Addresses don't resolve to a geographic location but only to your ISP's home base.
There are much better options - Orange support UMA which is found in Blackberries and some Android phones. This lets me use anyone's wireless network who shares a password with me. Ideal when I am working in a client's basement (or even my own home that only gets 3G coverage in the front window).
I can guess a few reasons - First it looks tidier that way. Secondly there is less strain on the cables as gravity would want to pull the cable down to the ground, bending the Cat-5 plugs. Third the sockets are protected from dust and muck being dropped into them.
You and I know how to change options in the installers. It is the average home user I am talking about here. The ones who have never heard of El'Reg. Especially those from a older generation. Many of these people will not change any setting "in case they break the computer". This means they assume they have to install these addons. Including the Bing, Ask, Google, Conduit bars. Every default gets left untouched in everything they install.
I suppose you do bring up one positive of Chrome - when that home user has their browser swap from IE they escape the 15 toolbars that have been installed into IE by a similar process.
I find a surprising number of my "home user" clients have Chrome on their PCs, but no idea where it came from. It gets packed into so many other product installers that it should be classed as Malware. I think I even spotted it as part of a Java Update installer which would give it a huge install base.
The average home user always accepts the defaults of any installation package. So gets stuck with Chrome without knowing how to get rid of it. This is the marketing method that Google have chosen. Which is dishonest.
Safari used to be installed as default with iTunes, until Apple stopped the practice due to complaints. Yet Google are getting away with these stealth installs.
Why on earth do they still have multiple stores open in a single town? In the past few years Game has bought up all the other competing high street computer game shops. The sensible companies then make decisions about keeping a single site per town and closing the older smaller and badly located shops.
So why on earth has the management allowed all the stores to stay open? THREE stores in the same street is just financial madness. And this is repeated around the UK.
So if the car in front stops, your car is supposed to automatically stop. Which just means the guy behind you slams into your car instead. (Well, I guess that could have happened anyway...)
How sensitive is that laser sensor? It would be easy to see a car slowing down, but did it spot the football also in the same graphic? Could it work out that a bouncing ball which bounces across the road usually means a kid following it?
This kind of thing can't all be passed to a computer as a meat-bag should always have better all round awareness. Unless they get lazy and trained that the computer will stop the car.
It is bad enough finding free channels for a WiFi setup as it is. If a council starts flooding an area it will be a massive headache. It is difficult where I live as there is a huge office block which is sitting on all three of the main channels (1, 6 and 11!!) I expect O2 will be just as greedy with their network.
As to "replacing home broadband" - I really doubt there will be the bandwidth once all the freeloaders jump on board. And just think of the fun security issues of sharing your network with all kinds of random people....
In this "green" world we are supposed to live in, how does the power consumption on these things compare with just plugging a cable in? I assume there is some wastage here?
Replying to my own post that is still in moderation... My mistake. I didn't realise that the thread linked by El'Reg had updates tagged on the end of it. So ignore my rubbish about the "June Release". (Even better would be if a mod could just delete my last sentence above there)
Winamp still rules though!! Nothing is as organised for a big music collection.
Are you sure you are not confused with something else? The Winamp installer upgrades old versions fine, keeping all my weird settings on different PCs. Have to skip the AOL crud, but that is easy (especially when every other installer now tries to trick you into installing toolbars...)
It is easy to install Winamp without the adverts. Most of them are just in the installer. And then a little bit of tweaking in the player kills off some of the "more info" features. AOL has not got their claws into this one - still plenty of independence with the devs (I am also not an AOL fan)
Still a great little player. Can't find anything else to support so many different formats, and none of that iTunes bloat. (Or the SHOP it is all based around...)
And isn't this "news" from El'Reg a little old? This release has been out since June!!
Ah.. the 300 baud modems which you shoved your phone handset into. Or that speedy upgrade to a 1200/75 modem, Certainly remember Prestel (and news stories of Prince Philip getting his account hacked).
Copying games among your mates in the local computer club. Or blowing your own EPROMs. Doing hardware upgrades inside the box. Controlling Lego robots via umbilical cords.
You actually got to see how it all worked, unlike these monster PCs with their flashy OS's of today.
Certainly started a career path for me after being a lucky early owner. Thanks to the Parents.
Isn't the original news item one of those Trolling news items designed to cause "uproar" and lots of page views? Has "side-line.com" ever posted anything of note before?
So Pete wants Apple to become a record label? I thought there was already various court cases agreed with Apple Corps and the remaining Beatles that Apple would not do that.
BSOD is a noticeably rare occurrence now. So rare that when you see someone trying to go "ha ha, windoze does blue screens" they always have an Win9x blue screen as their example...
Lack of on board memory and processors just a little too slow mean no backward support this time.
Or, at least that is current thought of various forums
(I own a Bold 9780, purchased in March, so have been watching this closely. What bugs does the wife get? And have you tried updating to 6.0.600? Seems bug free to me, but then I am not a Facebook person. Easy to update - crackberry.com forums can help)
The owner of the reservoir was on the radio on Monday Night talking about it. He also explained that his place is only one of 12 in the US with no roof on the processed \ clean part of the water storage. A roof is coming soon.
But since when did facts get in the way of a good story? Even the guy interviewing him on the radio kept missing the bit about this being one (of many) processed water storage tanks and not the main reservoir along with the rest of the normal duck mess and dead animals that normal reside in there.
The boss of the reservoir on the radio also mentioned that he could have safely ignored the guy peeing in the water as it was heavily diluted. And he has already had dozens of complaints about flushing the water. But just imagine the complaints he would of had if he hadn't of flushed it.
They are not exactly short of water in his area either.
The missing part of the story is this is not the main reservoir that was flushed - this is the water storage AFTER it has been treated and is now ready for the tap. We are only talking half a football pitch in size - not the whole reservoir plus ducks.
That reminds me of the client who would do their own zip file backups of data folders. And then store that zip file in that original data folder. So the next backup would include the previous backup. And so on. These (multiple) backup files exponentially grew and grew until the hard disk jammed full...
And how many people have found their clients backing up their Sage data to the same folder as Sage was installed in? And never taking those backups off site...
Competition first - install in the areas that don't need it
This is what has always annoyed me about these rollouts. BT will ALWAYS start by installing where their competitors are supplying a perfectly good network. Instead of going to the areas badly covered by current services, it just seems to be a priority to nick the customers of Virgin and other companies who have already installed a network at their own costs.
BRIGHTON KEMPTOWN does not need an upgrade. Most of the properties I visit in there are already 17Mbps connections on ADSL2+. And that doesn't include the Virgin Cable clients. Whereas I have a company based half way up the A24 near Horsham barely able to get 0.5Mbps.
I used to be a fan of Mesh as I bought many for clients. And they worked well and lasted for many years trouble free.
But in the last couple of years you could see the change happening. That lack of profits was showing up in the hardware. Cheaper PSUs were being used, and I was now seeing failures in their product on delivery. Graphics cards, RAM, and other items. All gets frustrating for my reputation and my client's new PC.
I also learnt long ago to never order a PC from them at Xmas as they never had enough staff to keep up with the demands.
A pity to see UK company go down... but they were also the cause of their own downfall. Spoiling a good reputation with cut-backs in the quality.
How would dimming the page help? Viruses already do this. They have been mimicking the Windows PC warnings for a number of years now - and this includes the dimming to make the user know that the button appearing on screen is complex and technical and needs to be pressed. (How many home users really understand a UNC prompt? Many just hit OK without thinking)
And it surprises me this is news, I have seen many variations of browser specific fake warnings in the past.
What we need to REALLY worry about is the day they start proof reading their warnings!!
So... following this logic... if the browser's default cookie settings are what sets the law. Does this mean that the Wireless law is back to front?
By default, a laptop will automatically connect to an unencrypted network... permission is implied by the network being open and the laptop automatically connecting. And yet that is "illegal"?
I saw this in the wild last month. The AV and anti-spyware on my client's PC failed to spot the Trojan. (I had to delete by hand using an Unbuntu boot disk)
On my client's PC, when they accessed their bank account, the virus was sitting as a proxy on the PC swapping the pages that would appear on the screen. The initial bank "front page" looked normal, and asked for the account number.
Then the second page which normally asks for "second, fourth and eighth" characters of the password was swapped for a VERY convincing looking fake page which asked for ALL of the password to be entered.
I am glad I scare by clients into paranoia as this client spotted the change of procedure at that stage. Even though the quality branded AV and anti-spyware programs could not spot it.
Most people will just assume that the Bank has changed its login system and carry on regardless. So this does not surprise me that it has landed so much cash for the scammers.
(Though I do wonder why the bank did not spot the patterns of cash transfers earlier?)
I am not naming the bank as there is no point. This is a scam that is probably running on many banks at the same time as it is such a clean looking con.
This type of attack has been going on for the past few years. Messages popping up trying to look like popular Anti-Virus products, or XP\Vista's own built in security warnings. It is all about trying to fool the unwary into clicking on the "give us 50 quid" links to get rid of the scary sounding list of infections.
@Bundle It - that would be daft. Then the virus writers would only need to target ONE form of defence which makes it an easier job for them to develop and test viruses. While we still have a competing market of products, then it is harder for a virus to really get hold.
This is a simple virus. Easy to kill. Doesn't work in Safe Mode. So just boot into there. Fire up msconfig.exe and you'll see the obvious filenames in the startup list. Then go look into your %appdata%\Local\ folder and you'll see a couple of randomly named folders with randomly named files in. Delete them.
NOD32 will also kill it off. (If you can get the update - or scan it as an extracted hard disk)
NOTE: Also go and check your Proxy Server settings as this is how it is stopping the updates of the AV programs.
If the exact filename and path is needed, this should mean your Documents are safe as the hacker will need to know your username to locate C:\Docs n Settings\Username\My Documents\passwords.txt
BUT... this surely means it is trivial to locate programs in the Windows folder. Like the registry files in c:\windows\system32\config\.
Is this also the same bug where the executables are usable? Did I read the demonstration ran c:\windows\calc.exe? As that would be a pain as C:\windows\regedit.exe is in the same place on everyone's windows PC.
Ah... of course... it is just a ploy to get everyone to upgrade from XP to Win7.
Now that was funny. Okay, so the news story is talking about a very old virus which has been around for months. Problem is, by placing "porn" into the You Tube title, it obviously fills the "you might be interested in these videos" list with... lots of porn....
Network Congestion? Not fscking surprising. One of the accounts I host there has just spat out ALL email I have ever received - which dates back to 2007. 700+ messages being REDELIVERED into my mailbox. Thank gawd I am weird enough to use Opera M2 mail client and it can show the newly arrived email in a different colour. Otherwise I'd of just double the size of my mailstore on the local PC.
I have also confused a few clients by replying to old 2007 emails as if they came today....
My own fault really, I have been putting of the migration of my "other" domain names due to their awkward transfer process. This is going to make me finally get my butt in gear and get it sorted.
The poster above is correct - you really do get what you pay for. The bare minimum costs of UK2 hide the horrendous service. And, of course, they nail you on excessive costs when you try and migrate OUT of their awful system.
The PC I found in a concrete manufacturing works (building kerbs stones, etc). When that was opened up, every horizontal surface (graphics card, NIC, Sound, HDD, etc) was covered in an inch thick layer of fine concrete dust. I would hate to think what that was doing to the hard disk breathe holes!!
And then there was the PC in a client's home. A flat with shiny wood floors and an overly fluffy cat. When I opened that Dell up, the front plastics were hiding a solid mat of cat fur. It was like an inch thick blanket there was so much of it. Jammed in all possible corners - including up the sides of the machine. After I cleaned that one out the client says "oh - it sounds a lot quieter now" Duh!!
One thing this job has taught me is the PC is a brilliant vacuum cleaner.
@Pablo - some of the sharing software out there is pretty lame. I have no idea where the kids find it from. But there are dozens of different flavours of program. And I've seen some which default to sharing everything in the My Documents folder. Some even have specific tick boxes to add in sharing for .doc file types. (why?)
Plenty of companies and hackers have taken open source P2P code and repackaged it for their own needs. Most efficient way of passing viruses around as the idiot targets download without a care.
Or we have an idiot who has shared his My Music folder, but then manages to copy documents into there as well. (Seriously - you will be amazed at the lack of knowledge of a file system that some users have. Not always their fault as there is no decent IT Training)
Combine idiot users with idiot software and this is the outcome. It is nothing to do with OS or Web Browser versions.
(I work as an IT Engineer visiting people's homes.... scary what is often found...)
Slightly annoying that the website doesn't seem to want to work in Opera Web Browser. Only loads in IE8 for me. (The rest of the NASA website has always worked fine in alternate browsers in the past)
Scarier still is the "powered by AOL" logo. Are we sure this isn't Apollo 13?
I have lost count of the number of times I have going into support a new company only to find the previous IT numbskull has named each PC after the member of staff it was built for.
Problem is, the staff leave and the computer keeps the same name. OR, even worse, the staff member changes post within the company and starts using a computer with someone else's name on it. OR the machine got retasked without a name change.
I have lost count of the errors I made in that company when trying to work out which computer was where as no one mentioned that Sharon used the machine called Angie and Angie had the machine called Tracy and the server was Sharon's old PC. ARG!!!
I now pick themes like elements or animals etc. Which means a little fun handing stupidly named boxes over to people who annoy me.
Changing the wallpaper is a standard virus tactic. Now the virus writers just need to add a BBC logo when then link you to their dodgy "anti-virus" websites. What the BBC did is stupid as it hands more ammo to the virus writers.
It makes more sense for an ISP to be blocking these infected machines, but that would mean port monitoring. So a minefield in all directions.
And anyone who calls a wallpaper a screensaver should be shot.
When the tube and buses were bombed in London, they shut down the mobile phone network and turned it into a restricted system. The police, fire, etc have their phone numbers registered so they have priority access during that time.
I ain't no expert, but that system sounds simple enough to implement in ANY city. Can't be that hard to collect mobile phone numbers of important services who will need access to the network in an emergency.
I was in London on 7/7/5 and it was funny to see very long queues at every phone box I walked past. :)
And can I just thank the FIA for coming up with such a good acronym.
F1 KERS.... we almost don't need the WAN version :)
I want to know what happens to that flywheel when the car hits a wall. Or other car.... I hope they have it bolted down well.... The odd wheel coming off at speed is bad enough, but that flywheel could lethal.
Didn't Microsoft try to do the "One ID to rule them all" with their MS Passport idea?
To me, OpenID is just as stupid as that. So, I can loose just ONE username and password pair to loose all my data now? Yeah... I trust that scrubby little forum to protect my OpenID.
Or why make the hacker's \ PI \ FBI job easier by giving them a "one stop shop" for all of my online identities and tastes. I quite LIKE the idea of having different identities everywhere. :)
Google - you are a search engine. Stick with what you know. :) Maybe get the search to work BETTER? This would be good. For example - being able to search for information on a product one owns without being bombarded with those useless pages trying to sell me another one. (Or a list of sites who can....). "No Sales Search" would be very useful.
Register
105 posts • joined Monday 19th March 2007 19:56 GMT
Page:
Re: Deja vu all over again
"Interesting. Tell me how do you know " the versions of dotnet I need"? Is their a magic Windows dependency tool I don't know about?"
My method is easy. Just strip all the .NET mess out of the PC and then reboot. Wait and see what complains. Too many little applications come with the need of this huge mess of a framework.
Once .NET has gone, you can then see which programs complain. Then check up their specs as to what they need. (Or find replacements written in a proper language)
Re: IMO
Trouble is, MAC addresses are easy to sniff and spoof if someone is determined to get in. Much safer to get to know your neighbours and then judge their technical abilities.
Debug versions?
So... how did a debug version of a component with logging still enabled make its way into an Official Release? Don't they test these things before sending them out to the masses? How did something so simple and obvious get through?
iCloud Advert
This is just a marketing ploy to get more people to sign up to iCloud.
http://othellohosts.net/
I've been with them for almost a decade now. Have dozens of clients there too. Darn fine quality of hosting. Lots of different packages and options. Been almost trouble free in that time. The techs are helpful and fast to reply to tickets. The accounts department is intelligent and can deal with complex issues. NO off shore call centres scripts or buck passing - you talk to the people who actually run the company.
The two occasions that there has been a DDoS there was plenty of information pouring out of their Twitter feed. Honest descriptions of what was happening and how they were fixing it. See the UK2 story in today's news about the BS they are spinning with their DDoS attack and you soon realise how good it is to have an honest company to deal with.
And I would also put some extra votes down to avoid 1&1 and Fasthosts. Have have nothing but pain with those companies. Lots of BS from the support. Always had to migrate my clients away from them. Always beware of "cheap" hosting - you get what you pay for.
Re: Femto cells??
Vodaphone sure signal - if you change your router, they are get you to reply to an email to confirm you are still at the same address. Don't know how much deeper that goes as many IP Addresses don't resolve to a geographic location but only to your ISP's home base.
There are much better options - Orange support UMA which is found in Blackberries and some Android phones. This lets me use anyone's wireless network who shares a password with me. Ideal when I am working in a client's basement (or even my own home that only gets 3G coverage in the front window).
Re: Bottom plug
I can guess a few reasons - First it looks tidier that way. Secondly there is less strain on the cables as gravity would want to pull the cable down to the ground, bending the Cat-5 plugs. Third the sockets are protected from dust and muck being dropped into them.
@nichobe
You and I know how to change options in the installers. It is the average home user I am talking about here. The ones who have never heard of El'Reg. Especially those from a older generation. Many of these people will not change any setting "in case they break the computer". This means they assume they have to install these addons. Including the Bing, Ask, Google, Conduit bars. Every default gets left untouched in everything they install.
I suppose you do bring up one positive of Chrome - when that home user has their browser swap from IE they escape the 15 toolbars that have been installed into IE by a similar process.
Chrome on Home PCs
I find a surprising number of my "home user" clients have Chrome on their PCs, but no idea where it came from. It gets packed into so many other product installers that it should be classed as Malware. I think I even spotted it as part of a Java Update installer which would give it a huge install base.
The average home user always accepts the defaults of any installation package. So gets stuck with Chrome without knowing how to get rid of it. This is the marketing method that Google have chosen. Which is dishonest.
Safari used to be installed as default with iTunes, until Apple stopped the practice due to complaints. Yet Google are getting away with these stealth installs.
Multiple Stores
Why on earth do they still have multiple stores open in a single town? In the past few years Game has bought up all the other competing high street computer game shops. The sensible companies then make decisions about keeping a single site per town and closing the older smaller and badly located shops.
So why on earth has the management allowed all the stores to stay open? THREE stores in the same street is just financial madness. And this is repeated around the UK.
Automatically Braking Cars
So if the car in front stops, your car is supposed to automatically stop. Which just means the guy behind you slams into your car instead. (Well, I guess that could have happened anyway...)
How sensitive is that laser sensor? It would be easy to see a car slowing down, but did it spot the football also in the same graphic? Could it work out that a bouncing ball which bounces across the road usually means a kid following it?
This kind of thing can't all be passed to a computer as a meat-bag should always have better all round awareness. Unless they get lazy and trained that the computer will stop the car.
Printer Test Page
So what are they going to put on the Printer Test Page in Windows 8?
That little flag in the corner has always been perfect for checking the colour is actually working, while not wasting tons of ink.
Messy....
It is bad enough finding free channels for a WiFi setup as it is. If a council starts flooding an area it will be a massive headache. It is difficult where I live as there is a huge office block which is sitting on all three of the main channels (1, 6 and 11!!) I expect O2 will be just as greedy with their network.
As to "replacing home broadband" - I really doubt there will be the bandwidth once all the freeloaders jump on board. And just think of the fun security issues of sharing your network with all kinds of random people....
Efficiency?
In this "green" world we are supposed to live in, how does the power consumption on these things compare with just plugging a cable in? I assume there is some wastage here?
ahh... weird thread...
Replying to my own post that is still in moderation... My mistake. I didn't realise that the thread linked by El'Reg had updates tagged on the end of it. So ignore my rubbish about the "June Release". (Even better would be if a mod could just delete my last sentence above there)
Winamp still rules though!! Nothing is as organised for a big music collection.
Eh?
Are you sure you are not confused with something else? The Winamp installer upgrades old versions fine, keeping all my weird settings on different PCs. Have to skip the AOL crud, but that is easy (especially when every other installer now tries to trick you into installing toolbars...)
No Adverts...
It is easy to install Winamp without the adverts. Most of them are just in the installer. And then a little bit of tweaking in the player kills off some of the "more info" features. AOL has not got their claws into this one - still plenty of independence with the devs (I am also not an AOL fan)
Still a great little player. Can't find anything else to support so many different formats, and none of that iTunes bloat. (Or the SHOP it is all based around...)
And isn't this "news" from El'Reg a little old? This release has been out since June!!
"online" in the early days
Ah.. the 300 baud modems which you shoved your phone handset into. Or that speedy upgrade to a 1200/75 modem, Certainly remember Prestel (and news stories of Prince Philip getting his account hacked).
Copying games among your mates in the local computer club. Or blowing your own EPROMs. Doing hardware upgrades inside the box. Controlling Lego robots via umbilical cords.
You actually got to see how it all worked, unlike these monster PCs with their flashy OS's of today.
Certainly started a career path for me after being a lucky early owner. Thanks to the Parents.
Re: But mobiles DO kill!
Natural selection. Thins out the idiots who do this and stops them from reproducing. A benefit to the gene pool.
Trolling news item
Isn't the original news item one of those Trolling news items designed to cause "uproar" and lots of page views? Has "side-line.com" ever posted anything of note before?
Apple the record label
So Pete wants Apple to become a record label? I thought there was already various court cases agreed with Apple Corps and the remaining Beatles that Apple would not do that.
Rare occurance
BSOD is a noticeably rare occurrence now. So rare that when you see someone trying to go "ha ha, windoze does blue screens" they always have an Win9x blue screen as their example...
No
Lack of on board memory and processors just a little too slow mean no backward support this time.
Or, at least that is current thought of various forums
(I own a Bold 9780, purchased in March, so have been watching this closely. What bugs does the wife get? And have you tried updating to 6.0.600? Seems bug free to me, but then I am not a Facebook person. Easy to update - crackberry.com forums can help)
On Radio Monday Night
The owner of the reservoir was on the radio on Monday Night talking about it. He also explained that his place is only one of 12 in the US with no roof on the processed \ clean part of the water storage. A roof is coming soon.
But since when did facts get in the way of a good story? Even the guy interviewing him on the radio kept missing the bit about this being one (of many) processed water storage tanks and not the main reservoir along with the rest of the normal duck mess and dead animals that normal reside in there.
and another thing...
The boss of the reservoir on the radio also mentioned that he could have safely ignored the guy peeing in the water as it was heavily diluted. And he has already had dozens of complaints about flushing the water. But just imagine the complaints he would of had if he hadn't of flushed it.
They are not exactly short of water in his area either.
Missing part of the story
The missing part of the story is this is not the main reservoir that was flushed - this is the water storage AFTER it has been treated and is now ready for the tap. We are only talking half a football pitch in size - not the whole reservoir plus ducks.
backup to the backup folder
That reminds me of the client who would do their own zip file backups of data folders. And then store that zip file in that original data folder. So the next backup would include the previous backup. And so on. These (multiple) backup files exponentially grew and grew until the hard disk jammed full...
And how many people have found their clients backing up their Sage data to the same folder as Sage was installed in? And never taking those backups off site...
Users are such fun...
Competition first - install in the areas that don't need it
This is what has always annoyed me about these rollouts. BT will ALWAYS start by installing where their competitors are supplying a perfectly good network. Instead of going to the areas badly covered by current services, it just seems to be a priority to nick the customers of Virgin and other companies who have already installed a network at their own costs.
BRIGHTON KEMPTOWN does not need an upgrade. Most of the properties I visit in there are already 17Mbps connections on ADSL2+. And that doesn't include the Virgin Cable clients. Whereas I have a company based half way up the A24 near Horsham barely able to get 0.5Mbps.
Lack of cash showed in the hardware
I used to be a fan of Mesh as I bought many for clients. And they worked well and lasted for many years trouble free.
But in the last couple of years you could see the change happening. That lack of profits was showing up in the hardware. Cheaper PSUs were being used, and I was now seeing failures in their product on delivery. Graphics cards, RAM, and other items. All gets frustrating for my reputation and my client's new PC.
I also learnt long ago to never order a PC from them at Xmas as they never had enough staff to keep up with the demands.
A pity to see UK company go down... but they were also the cause of their own downfall. Spoiling a good reputation with cut-backs in the quality.
Dimming the page? Viruses already do that.
How would dimming the page help? Viruses already do this. They have been mimicking the Windows PC warnings for a number of years now - and this includes the dimming to make the user know that the button appearing on screen is complex and technical and needs to be pressed. (How many home users really understand a UNC prompt? Many just hit OK without thinking)
And it surprises me this is news, I have seen many variations of browser specific fake warnings in the past.
What we need to REALLY worry about is the day they start proof reading their warnings!!
title
So... following this logic... if the browser's default cookie settings are what sets the law. Does this mean that the Wireless law is back to front?
By default, a laptop will automatically connect to an unencrypted network... permission is implied by the network being open and the laptop automatically connecting. And yet that is "illegal"?
Any bank
I saw this in the wild last month. The AV and anti-spyware on my client's PC failed to spot the Trojan. (I had to delete by hand using an Unbuntu boot disk)
On my client's PC, when they accessed their bank account, the virus was sitting as a proxy on the PC swapping the pages that would appear on the screen. The initial bank "front page" looked normal, and asked for the account number.
Then the second page which normally asks for "second, fourth and eighth" characters of the password was swapped for a VERY convincing looking fake page which asked for ALL of the password to be entered.
I am glad I scare by clients into paranoia as this client spotted the change of procedure at that stage. Even though the quality branded AV and anti-spyware programs could not spot it.
Most people will just assume that the Bank has changed its login system and carry on regardless. So this does not surprise me that it has landed so much cash for the scammers.
(Though I do wonder why the bank did not spot the patterns of cash transfers earlier?)
I am not naming the bank as there is no point. This is a scam that is probably running on many banks at the same time as it is such a clean looking con.
White number pads
Aren't those white and black numeric pads timers? That would explain the lack of buttons.
Old News
This type of attack has been going on for the past few years. Messages popping up trying to look like popular Anti-Virus products, or XP\Vista's own built in security warnings. It is all about trying to fool the unwary into clicking on the "give us 50 quid" links to get rid of the scary sounding list of infections.
@Bundle It - that would be daft. Then the virus writers would only need to target ONE form of defence which makes it an easier job for them to develop and test viruses. While we still have a competing market of products, then it is harder for a virus to really get hold.
Easy to kill
This is a simple virus. Easy to kill. Doesn't work in Safe Mode. So just boot into there. Fire up msconfig.exe and you'll see the obvious filenames in the startup list. Then go look into your %appdata%\Local\ folder and you'll see a couple of randomly named folders with randomly named files in. Delete them.
NOD32 will also kill it off. (If you can get the update - or scan it as an extracted hard disk)
NOTE: Also go and check your Proxy Server settings as this is how it is stopping the updates of the AV programs.
Thanks
Ahh... perfect. This solved a puzzle I had with a Toshiba laptop. After following the instructions in the Microsoft post, the BSOD has gone.
I had a different error number for the STOP, but fixed the same way by uninstalling that update.
(Good to see MS put the answer at the TOP of that thread instead of having to wade through a discussion)
Docs safe, applications less so?
If the exact filename and path is needed, this should mean your Documents are safe as the hacker will need to know your username to locate C:\Docs n Settings\Username\My Documents\passwords.txt
BUT... this surely means it is trivial to locate programs in the Windows folder. Like the registry files in c:\windows\system32\config\.
Is this also the same bug where the executables are usable? Did I read the demonstration ran c:\windows\calc.exe? As that would be a pain as C:\windows\regedit.exe is in the same place on everyone's windows PC.
Ah... of course... it is just a ploy to get everyone to upgrade from XP to Win7.
Try version 5.571 to avoid the installer bugs
Your article should read: "Install version 5.571" as the initial 5.57 release had a buggy installer for Win Vista.
(I think this is the version you will now get when following the 5.57 download links.. but worth being sure)
A Title
Now that was funny. Okay, so the news story is talking about a very old virus which has been around for months. Problem is, by placing "porn" into the You Tube title, it obviously fills the "you might be interested in these videos" list with... lots of porn....
Bunch of amatures....
Network Congestion? Not fscking surprising. One of the accounts I host there has just spat out ALL email I have ever received - which dates back to 2007. 700+ messages being REDELIVERED into my mailbox. Thank gawd I am weird enough to use Opera M2 mail client and it can show the newly arrived email in a different colour. Otherwise I'd of just double the size of my mailstore on the local PC.
I have also confused a few clients by replying to old 2007 emails as if they came today....
My own fault really, I have been putting of the migration of my "other" domain names due to their awkward transfer process. This is going to make me finally get my butt in gear and get it sorted.
The poster above is correct - you really do get what you pay for. The bare minimum costs of UK2 hide the horrendous service. And, of course, they nail you on excessive costs when you try and migrate OUT of their awful system.
A Title
Seen many worse.... with my top two being:
The PC I found in a concrete manufacturing works (building kerbs stones, etc). When that was opened up, every horizontal surface (graphics card, NIC, Sound, HDD, etc) was covered in an inch thick layer of fine concrete dust. I would hate to think what that was doing to the hard disk breathe holes!!
And then there was the PC in a client's home. A flat with shiny wood floors and an overly fluffy cat. When I opened that Dell up, the front plastics were hiding a solid mat of cat fur. It was like an inch thick blanket there was so much of it. Jammed in all possible corners - including up the sides of the machine. After I cleaned that one out the client says "oh - it sounds a lot quieter now" Duh!!
One thing this job has taught me is the PC is a brilliant vacuum cleaner.
Lemonwires
@Pablo - some of the sharing software out there is pretty lame. I have no idea where the kids find it from. But there are dozens of different flavours of program. And I've seen some which default to sharing everything in the My Documents folder. Some even have specific tick boxes to add in sharing for .doc file types. (why?)
Plenty of companies and hackers have taken open source P2P code and repackaged it for their own needs. Most efficient way of passing viruses around as the idiot targets download without a care.
Or we have an idiot who has shared his My Music folder, but then manages to copy documents into there as well. (Seriously - you will be amazed at the lack of knowledge of a file system that some users have. Not always their fault as there is no decent IT Training)
Combine idiot users with idiot software and this is the outcome. It is nothing to do with OS or Web Browser versions.
(I work as an IT Engineer visiting people's homes.... scary what is often found...)
Lazy website
Slightly annoying that the website doesn't seem to want to work in Opera Web Browser. Only loads in IE8 for me. (The rest of the NASA website has always worked fine in alternate browsers in the past)
Scarier still is the "powered by AOL" logo. Are we sure this isn't Apollo 13?
Staff Names
I have lost count of the number of times I have going into support a new company only to find the previous IT numbskull has named each PC after the member of staff it was built for.
Problem is, the staff leave and the computer keeps the same name. OR, even worse, the staff member changes post within the company and starts using a computer with someone else's name on it. OR the machine got retasked without a name change.
I have lost count of the errors I made in that company when trying to work out which computer was where as no one mentioned that Sharon used the machine called Angie and Angie had the machine called Tracy and the server was Sharon's old PC. ARG!!!
I now pick themes like elements or animals etc. Which means a little fun handing stupidly named boxes over to people who annoy me.
Virus tactics
Changing the wallpaper is a standard virus tactic. Now the virus writers just need to add a BBC logo when then link you to their dodgy "anti-virus" websites. What the BBC did is stupid as it hands more ammo to the virus writers.
It makes more sense for an ISP to be blocking these infected machines, but that would mean port monitoring. So a minefield in all directions.
And anyone who calls a wallpaper a screensaver should be shot.
London 7/7/5
When the tube and buses were bombed in London, they shut down the mobile phone network and turned it into a restricted system. The police, fire, etc have their phone numbers registered so they have priority access during that time.
I ain't no expert, but that system sounds simple enough to implement in ANY city. Can't be that hard to collect mobile phone numbers of important services who will need access to the network in an emergency.
I was in London on 7/7/5 and it was funny to see very long queues at every phone box I walked past. :)
Extended countdowns?
So does that mean when the do the "countdown to midnight" it should be...
10...9...8...7...6...5...4...3...2..1...1... Midnight?
It will be a New Year for the Pedants to have fun. :-)
Broken Links in Article
Check the first page of the article. It has two links back to previous articles. And these are broken as they have a bogus %22 on the end of them.
Trim the %22 and the linky works. :)
F1 KERS - great acronym
And can I just thank the FIA for coming up with such a good acronym.
F1 KERS.... we almost don't need the WAN version :)
I want to know what happens to that flywheel when the car hits a wall. Or other car.... I hope they have it bolted down well.... The odd wheel coming off at speed is bad enough, but that flywheel could lethal.
OpenID? MS Passport?
Didn't Microsoft try to do the "One ID to rule them all" with their MS Passport idea?
To me, OpenID is just as stupid as that. So, I can loose just ONE username and password pair to loose all my data now? Yeah... I trust that scrubby little forum to protect my OpenID.
Or why make the hacker's \ PI \ FBI job easier by giving them a "one stop shop" for all of my online identities and tastes. I quite LIKE the idea of having different identities everywhere. :)
Google - you are a search engine. Stick with what you know. :) Maybe get the search to work BETTER? This would be good. For example - being able to search for information on a product one owns without being bombarded with those useless pages trying to sell me another one. (Or a list of sites who can....). "No Sales Search" would be very useful.
Page: