* Posts by Mog0

29 publicly visible posts • joined 20 Nov 2008

Risk of installing dodgy extensions from Chrome store way worse than Google's letting on, study suggests

Mog0

1% of installs are malware is terrible

1% of installs are malware is not the boast they seem to think it is!

That rate is shocking, particularly when you consider how many millions of downloads they have.

It certainly makes me even more cautious about extensions.

Given the majority of downloads will be big name extensions that won't be malware, what proportion of extensions in the store are actually malware? For 1% of installs to be malware, you have to think a very high percentage of extensions are malware.

Zombie webcams? Pah! It's the really BIG 'Things' that scare me

Mog0

Crap security devices

I used to work with Modbus based devices that had tried to implement security. They had added an extension to modbus that required you to send a special message type with a password before they would respond to any other requests. After a period of 30 minutes idle, the password would be required again.

When they implemented it, the devices used serial connections for all their comms so it wasn't so terrible (just not great); unfortunately someone had later thought, we can add a serial to ethernet converter to the back of the device and sell it at a huge premium (over $3k). This meant that you had an authorised computer that would unlock the device and then poll it for data every minute so that anyone else on the network could just make requests and it would respond without requiring them to authenticate. The device's software didn't understand that the requests were any different to the ones from the authorised computer as it only understood serial.

Good example of how companies can add functionality without considering the security consequences. And these devices were from the market leader who had sold tens of thousands of these devices around the world, many of them controlling critical infrastructure with potential for huge damage (and potential loss of life) if they were tampered with.

Windows 10 won't help. The PC biz is doomed, DOOMED, I TELL YOU

Mog0

1 billion devices, not sales

The 1 billion figure Microsoft gives does not require a huge increase in sales as it includes devices that will be upgraded from earlier versions (free for consumers). Taking this into account many think this figure is actually not at all ambitious.

Microsoft shutters Office 365's free web site service

Mog0

Azure Websites

I'd imagine one of those options they will announce would be the FREE Azure Websites.

Virgin Media only puts limited limits on its Unlimited service

Mog0

Re: Fcuking Hypocrite

Have a look on their web site...the full details are there, you just need to know to look (and search because it's tricky to find) but it is there.

Lumia 2520: Our Vulture gets his claws on Nokia's first Windows RT slab

Mog0

You can use office with Office 365 subscription too

If you have a business office 365 subscription you get a licence for using Office RT for business use.

New Development. Where do we go?

Mog0

Re: Dev Platform

In response to JASR's post, I have worked on 4D for 11 years now, primarily on Windows and while I agree with the deployment aspects (really easy) and it is great to have an integrated db engine; however I feel as though I should pass on the other side of my experience with 4D. It's terrible.

As a company we waste so much time trying to track down and work around bugs in 4D, the performance is awful (it's essentially single-threaded, all of your code runs in 1 thread although the db engine can now use extra threads, which makes little difference), they don't have any degree of object-oriented code, their development environment is a nightmare to use and there is basically no practical source control tools that work properly.

It may meet your requirements but the only reason we are still using it is inertia. It would take a monumental effort to port onto another platform, although when you look at the time we waste due to 4D's inadequacies, I wonder how long it would take to make that time back. We are still thinking of moving away

I have used .net based languages and c++ in visual studio quite a bit on my own projects and feel they are just 10-20 years ahead of where 4D are (I'm not exagerating) and advancing faster. It's always amazing when I suddenly find that tapping the tab key will automatically do something that would require me to write 50-100 lines of code in 4D to achieve.

If I were looking at a new platform I would certainly start my search with c#, it's just fantastic. MS do seem to be trying to shift platforms a lot at the moment, silverlight being ended and WinRT coming in for example but most of these platforms are actually based on the same technology (.net / XAML) and moving between them wouldn't be that hard. They're more like variants of the same platform.

Hope this helps.

OUCH: Google preps ad goo injection for Android mobile Gmail app

Mog0

Ermm...Google don't charge for Android. That's the point. The manufacturers only have to pay for patent licensing for all the stuff Google ripped-off from other companies.

No money is received directly by Google when you buy an Android handset.

Ofcom launches idiot's guide to traffic-shaping

Mog0

Prioritising by type - good, Prioritising by source - bad

As far as I'm concerned, prioritising VOIP / Gaming / Video streams is a good thing as if my web page / e-mail takes an extra second to download due to congestion, I'm not going to be too bothered but if my video / audio stutters or if I get shot by someone I didn't see, I will be pi**ed off.

On the other hand if ISPs start charging netflix or youtube or anyone else for access to networks I see this as completely wrong and this should be banned.

The traffic should be prioritised by the latency sensitivity of the traffic because that is good for the consumer's experience but slowing down youtube to the point it's unusable because Google didn't give them any money is NOT in the customer's interests. This difference seems to be missed in most of the discussion I read. It's always, "traffic shaping is bad!!"

Of course when the network is not congested, the priorities will make no difference as everything will just get straight through.

Internet freedom groups urge W3C to keep DRM out of HTML

Mog0
FAIL

Re: Not sure why EME is necessary

Except you're not paying to own it. You're paying to watch it ONCE. The same as paying to go to the cinema does not entitle you to take a video camera in so you can watch it again and again.

If you want to own it then you pay more and buy a download, which is completely different from this streaming system and this article is irrelevant to.

Nokia Lumia 820 WinPho 8 review

Mog0
FAIL

Re: Too expensive for what you get..

Just a correction, 8S and 820 have identical resolution. They are both 480*800, the same as all WP7 handsets. The only other resolutions allowed are 720*1280 (as seen on the 8X) and 768*1280 (as seen on the Lumia 920)

Google mingles Drive and Gmail for 10GB attachments

Mog0

You're right. I'm pretty sure Hotmail/skydrive has been doing this for a year or two already

Prince William 'day with my chopper' pics reveal more than intended

Mog0

Re: Daily Mail?

So rather than trust the biassed right-wing Daily Mail you'll wait for the biassed left-wing Guardian? You've just picked possibly the two furthest extremes of the mainstream UK newspaper industry. How about something in between, you might get somewhere closer to the truth?

DoCoMo tests blackout-proof hydrogen cell base station in Japan

Mog0
Facepalm

Re: Lack of maintenance??

Good point...they are connected to the mains normally. Whoops. Of course relies upon supply of water, either collecting rainfall, which would be dependent on weather, or connected to mains water (which would probably be expensive given the locations of many cell towers).

Mog0
WTF?

Lack of maintenance??

Won't the networks have to go around with a hydrogen tanker after every power cut, topping the hydrogen levels back up? I'm assuming that these sites won't have their own power stations to generate electricity to produce hydrogen from water in order to produce electricity.

Mog0
Mushroom

Cool...massive explosions!!!

Should look good on the TV when the hydrogen goes bang :-)

EE 4G LTE review

Mog0

Error in article??

From the article "Data connections made during a call will likewise only run at HSPA+ speeds"

Is this actually correct?

In the US only the iPhone5 has this limitation, all other handsets will use 3G voice and 4G data simultaneously. I can't imagine why the EE's network would work differently.

N00bs vs Windows 8: We lock six people in a room with new OS

Mog0

Re: Its not difficult!

That's why you shouldn't use Windows XP :-)

Mog0

The reason for removing the orb

They removed the Orb because people would go to the desktop and get back to the start screen easily. Then they go to a TIFKAM app and get stuck because there's no orb. This way the start screen navigation is consistent regardless of where you are and it only takes a tutorial or a quick nudge from someone to find it and you're away.

Vaunted Windows 8 RTM updates 'actually featured from Win2000'

Mog0
FAIL

The Reg is overstating the claims

He only claimed that some of the updates that are done for OEMs were not released to the public until the SP in previous versions but are in Win8. He did not claim that no updates were released, just that SOME weren't and these are now released as well.

Never let the truth get in the way of a good story!

Climate sceptic? You're probably a 'Birther', don't vaccinate your kids

Mog0
WTF?

You count engineer as a scientist?

"As usual, we would advance our preferred term, "boffin", for an actual real scientist (physicist, engineer, archaeologist etc) to differentiate from the trick-cyclists, sociologists and other marginal eggheads."

Engineers are not scientists, they are a whole different stream of profession in their own right. I am personally a software engineer and am proud of the term, which means that companies like BT calling their techs who come round to your house with a screwdriver "engineers" annoys me after I spent 4 years at a top university studying to become an engineer.

The best description of the difference between an engineer and a scientist I've come across is, an engineer learns in order to build things and a scientist builds things in order to learn. The overall aim is different. Science is about learning and engineering is about building something useful (using knowledge that has come from science).

Bonking payment by NFC doubled by Olympics splash

Mog0
Alert

In my experience the contactless terminals aren't marked as contactless

The only place I've ever used contactless is McDonalds and that's only because I'd read online that they have it in all their stores. There is no contactless symbol on the terminal, which would be the obvious way of advertising its availability.

New vicious UEFI bootkit vuln found for Windows 8

Mog0

Re: still vulnerable to the old attacks if the SecureBoot technology is not turned on by default

Which is exactly what Microsoft require for certification and exactly what the Linux fanboys have been complaining about, saying it has no value.

Mog0
WTF?

This article is complete crap

Basically what it says is that the new security in Windows 8 can be bypassed unless the new security feature, i.e. secureboot, is turned on.

Well blow me, if you turn off the security feature that is designed to stop bootloaders then you can load a bootloader!!!

Mog0
FAIL

Re: We told you so

Except if you read the article, Secureboot stops the attack!!!

E-publisher 'fesses up: 'Apple UDIDs were ours'

Mog0

Re: Added credentials?

I read that as being 2% added to the company's database after the breach and missing from pastebin...could be either way I suppose.

Windows Phone 8: Microsoft quite literally can't lose

Mog0
FAIL

ALL phones are sold by carriers at an up front loss!!

You make a point that AT&T are selling the Nokias at an up front loss but ALL contract phones are sold at a loss, they make their money back on the contract (at least that's the aim).

Google Maps takes shelter from the British summer

Mog0
FAIL

Already Competition

Errmm...didn't bing maps introduce this to the UK a couple of weeks back using Nokia's mapping?

They certainly have maps of "The Centre MK", amongst others that I looked at.

MacBook buyers bite Apple over copy protection cock-up

Mog0

Surely they can not set the content flags

The HDCP only kicks in if the content being played demands it. That's why you can still see your desktop and it only affects media playback.

If Apple didn't set the flags in their iTunes content then it wouldn't be an issue.