Posts by mtcoder

Pro-tip: Steal a TARDIS to survive Windows Server preview death

While I think they will probably just release new keys to drag it on. It seems more like they have made large changes after getting initial feedback and after some of the company direction changes. I mean they are completely changing how windows 10 manages updates, taking that into some account of a change in the server tier as well is going to be a big step also.

Not to mention I know "why" people are in a blah mood, cause they built systems off the new version and want to keep those systems up. On the flip side though a technical preview is and never should be a starting out and deciding factor for your system builds. Meaning boo hoo your preview ran out, shouldn't have anything important on it anyways.

DAMN YOU! Microsoft blasts Google over zero-day blabgasm

Re: Sorry, but Google were uttely wrong.

Well the patch has / could of been ready for 2 weeks now, but MS has a well documented patch process, which has to be in place due to it's enterprise aspects. Only are super serious deadly to OS patches ever made out of their Patch Tuesday pipeline. Everyone knows about patch Tuesday to the point hell we all call it Patch Tuesday it has it's own title and day. Lots of system admins have whole business processes that affect billions of dollars in productivity setup around patch Tuesday. Changing that process isn't something MS takes lightly.

Also this is OS patching, which means you have about 1 billion possible hardware aspects that could cause problems, a few billion lines of code something could screw up, and you best damn well make sure your fix doesn't make a bigger hole elsewere. Testing code takes a lot of time, with it comes to top end programming. Really don't want a patch to come out then see the headline, UAC patch prevents users from installing any new products or running half their applications. Not exactly where you want to be. Also it's part of UAC so that means group policy, Azure services, Active directory, System Center, all have to be updated. It's not a super simple fix to say.

FCC MUST protect net neutrality to preserve AMERICA, say Google et al

Problem is monopoly bound setups

reason we need net neutrality isn't because we need to slap the telecoms, it's cause they all run a monopoly and because of that there needs to be oversight. In probably close to 85% of the US there is only 1 provider for high speed internet. In most cases only 2 providers period, meaning 1 cable and 1 dsl. Only cause DSL is running across unused copper phone that were built out decades ago.

So that means the consumer has only 1 choice, which means the content provider only has 1 choice to reach that customer. With the telecomm being in between, saying well Netflix you want to reach my customers it's going to cost you extra. Oh and customers that want to watch Netflix we going to charge you extra, but... if you would like you could use our services which run much faster.

I mean they already get to double dip. They charge the content providers for bandwidth then they charge the consumers for bandwidth speeds / bandwidth. Now they looking to nickel and dime the system to improve their less valuable offerings. Also in normal monopoly situations you can't bundle none related items together in order to get an unfair market value.

Samsung to offer Apple Dock style Start Button in Windows? Really?

I see this is more a bash windows 8 UI article than it's an article about samsung or mashable. But starting to expect no less. from posts here.

Was so close to having an ok article about mashup most likely just making crap up but you derailed your entire article into a windows 8 bash session. And really that video was flawed on so many levels, which has been stated numerous times. For example the upper right and lower right corners were affected by his parallel install so the user couldn't get to windows 8 menus if he wanted to. Also came out his dad never used windows 7 either, and had no real notion of what the windows key does. Which is fair going from xp to Windows 8 is a much larger shock, vs going from window 7 to 8. But so is driving his 2001 convertible vs a 2012 one. He would get out and try to put the top down himself, and wouldn't be able to figure it out till someone showed him the button for it, which in a lot of new ones is hidden in wierd places.

Amazon exploited by hacker in scribe's epic Apple iCloud pwn

Re: There's always holes

The average person changes their phone number about 3 times their lifetime. Not that much of an inconvienance to remember to update accounts. Also nothing states the systems can't just create you a new account. Oh you don't know your phone number no problem, please go setup a new account. Now for things like Apple / Google services where a new account means being locked out of your life. chances are you aren't going to forget to update the account information, but in those cases, there is still email confirmation options. Ok we will gladly make those changes I have sent you an email with a confirmation number. Please check your email and let me know that code. At least then their is that "3rd party" validation. Nothing will be fool proof, but having those other accounts he user has to have access to already in order to make account access style changes, greatly peels off the hackers ability to break into an account. There is some responsibility of the consumer to protect themselves and if all it means is they have to update their account information that blocks access to their compute, facebook account, twitter account, backup's, music library, etc it wouldn't be too hard to ensure a few profile pieces are up to date. And just like most systems provide a secondary number fall over. If we can't reach you at your primary phone please provide a secondary, like a relative parent, brother, sister. Chances are both of you changing your phone numbers at the same time without you updating your account becomes really unlikely.

Problem is sites need more generic information about people

The problem is companies are forced to secure "sensitive" data and in doing so make it hard for customer support to accurately validate the person on the other end of the line. But it's a business model that can change. For example when he called into amazon for the account changes they should go thank you for the call, please hang up and we will call you on the phone number on the account. Poof instead of making the account change Matt gets a phone call saying hey we just talked want me to make that change now? Um hell no and what change? Something so simple quickly rips most of the control away from the hacker. To add on to security take a step like blizzard does to cut down on hacked accounts, with their authenticator service. A free phone application or even a cheap key chain, that generates authentication codes associated with the account to validate the end user. So now to even log into an account the hacker needs the authenticator. So this really helps, but what happens when matt is at a party and gets drunk and passed out someone swipes his phone for a few and changes all of his accounts. Well shame on matt, but still possible or if it became the new industry standard stealing a phone would be gold mine for stealing identity. So then what? Well add on an occasional personal information data. This can work for smaller companies that couldn't afford to setup authenticators. When I sign up ask me my shoe size, birthmarks, scars, bra size, body mass index, tattos. When there is an account concern you can quickly identify the person with said things, and well dumpster diving and most likely even social media scraping won't give you the data. If amazon asked phobia what his shoe size was he would of been like um 9, and I don't like that metric cause it could be guessed via seeing a photo of his feet, but it's a 40% chance to randomly guess it. Add on a scar or birthmark or tatoo and you can lock it down pretty tightly. Now the problem with using this is people will freak out, over a company knowing this data. So it will rarely be given out by people. Which is ironic cause well the marketers already know most of it. But the illusion is people don't know it. Security questions tend to be an ok step but often get worked around cause people don't remember what they typed, and it's usually case sensitive. I know I have locked self out of an account cause I didn't put a capital for my dog's name, but hey calling support was easy and they didn't even ask for security question, cause it was what caused acocunt to get locked out. Non of these stop it completely, but with customer call backs, aka amazon calling the phone on file to preform account changes, adding on an authenticator for log ins on the web aka when no support is involved, and asking personal identifying questions that actually work, aka shoe size, tattoo, birth mark, and having all of them, listed will make use very secure and make it hard to hack into an account. Cause even if they steal passwords, without the authenticator configured to the person's phone the password is pointless.

Google versus Facebook: stop your photocopiers

This is pretty funny

Sorry but you are quite off bases, facebook still struggles to become overly profitable, their bottom line ends up being dangerously low all the time. Not to mention with EU fighting them over privacy, they could be forced to lose even more revenue options. Not to mention while overly popular, and they have bought a few companies out to get to their engineers they don't offer much beyond a database and a user interface to access it. Now granted they have gotten huge off the backs of 3rd party developers which reap the social aspects, but facebook as an individual entity has little more than a CMS where everyone gets their own portal. Nothing new or cutting edge at all.

Now Google has impressive abilities, and while they lost 1 person to facebook oh noes, and Google wants to start its own social aspect, aka like everyone is doing. Doesn't mean facebook / google are the "end all"

Also to claim Windows 7 was not a signifigant update / change in OS is a blinded look, it moved windows OS into full touch screen design. Windows 7 is built from the ground up to be touch screen friendly. That is a pretty big shift, not to mention the back end addition of powershell, and home network are huge pieces of windows 7 that companies are starting to utilize. I won't go into the details, but they are big for work at home people. A new driving trend in business that windows 7 was built to assist / support.

Now I do agree things are going to the web, but Google is just a new player, Apple has shot itself in the foot in regards to web, so we will leave them on the side line, but Google doesn't make web development languages, the make their add on language for chrome, but they don't create the backbone of the web. Now they do provide android developer kit, but once again you can't go and build a standalone webpage with it. So you are forgetting about the open source products, and microsofts web development tools, which as of this week, went even further into simplicity and market appeal with razor and webmatrix. Microsoft has probably spent more money into the web than Google and Facebook will only ever dream about putting towards it.

Lets face it the real battle is going to be Google vs Microsoft and everything else will just be hanging on and picking up the scraps. Now at the current moment there are some front runners Apple, Facebook, etc but being new to their respected areas is starting to show as they run into regulators, privacy advocates, anti-trust cases, etc Google and MS are well / better versed in dealing / working around those issues, and have products to support them if they get shut down on one aspect. Think about what happens to Facebook if Europe officials fine and prevent Facebook from sharing any profile information, cause it may contain information about a person that has never used Facebook, poof Facebook loses profit options for Europe, till they can rebuild their core system, and rework how information is shared. Even at that point it will become significantly difficult to provide the information vendors want to buy.

Zuckerberg: 'I am a prophet'

He didn't do anything

Facebook only survives or is what is has become, due to the 3rd party developers who build applications for it. Take away all the games from facebook, and you have myspace which is um oh yeah dead in the water.

If there wasn't a billion quizes, and games to play with your friends then facebook would never got off the ground past colleges. So really facebook and Mr. Z hasn't done anything but create a socialized gaming site.

If you look at the facebook states is something stupid like 80% of all updates are game messages. People log in, post a hello, and then play a game or two, say goodnight and move on. That or its a bored housewife looking for something to chat to.

Oh and a prego mom that wants to whine for 9 months.