Posts by thondwe

Meta proposes doing away with leap seconds

Netware 3 - But suspect both W95 and Netware predated (huh!) the UK change to a more predictable date for switching to/from BST -"Summer Time Order 2002" I think

Deploying disaster-proof apps may be easier than you think

Re: Well I'll be

Cloud costs include all the stuff you don't £££ account for locally or don't even do - land, energy, maintenance, rolling upgrades, 24x7 staffing, hot spares, security, etc etc + some profit obs

Bit like owning a classic car vs leasing a modern one - fun doing it all yourself, but missing loads of modern benefits - air bags, crash cells, air con, etc...

Microsoft Teams outage widens to take out M365 services, admin center

Points of Failure

POTS telephone - multiple single point of failure. Teams multiple access routes (different ISPs, 3/4G etc), carefully constructed layers of resilience and fault tolerance = hugely complex = multiple points of spectacular failure.

Microsoft to blockheads: NFTs and blockchains aren't welcome in Minecraft

Re: kudos !

Still not as good as the Beano explanation...

Rocky Linux 9 and its new build service enter the ring

Re: I don't get it

A lot of sites need something stable and supported by Enterprise Vendors (e.g. HP Server Tools/Drivers, VMware Tools, Enterprise Apps etc) but begrudge actually paying RedHat when the OS is open source and they have local Linux expertise?

Weird Flex, but OK: Now you can officially turn these PCs, Macs into Chromebooks

Think of the Children

Schools use Chromebooks - certainly in a lot of Wales anyway, so dusting of an old laptop and putting Flex on it is a use case. Or being able to buy a Windows laptop, run it as a Chromebook and then push it to Windows/Linux as the kids need change?

What annoys is the lack of an ISO to install in your hypervisor of choice - same use case - school chrome, but without tying up a piece of tin?

FYI: BMW puts heated seats, other features behind paywall

Weight and Waste?

So I get a car with a bunch of features built in that I don't want - but that's a waste of resources to build and install and it's extra weight the car is dragging around?

I can see an augment for subscription for updating the software for functional improvements - but not for fixes and certainly not for enabling hardware.

Take the day off: Windows Autopatch is live and can even fix cloudy PCs

Nearly Excited

For a moment I thought that AutoPatch would also patch other Apps - no such joy, basically it's windows update with a cloudy management layer isn't it?

If only ALL Apps were in the App Store, then they'd benefit from Auto Updates (Apple/Google style) - we've looked at patch management tools and they fail for large numbers of commercial applications I assume due to close source/licencing requirements - they can't patch something they don't buy?

Near-undetectable malware linked to Russia's Cozy Bear

Re: Come back Windows ...

Just tried to open a couple of ISOs on my Windows 11 machine - all give me a "Security Warning" "Unknown Publisher" dialog (Even on a Windows Server ISO) - BUT there is a tick box to "Always Ask" - which clearly can be unticked - maybe a GPO for disabling, but - only requires a one Dories in an org to just click through...

Rufus and ExplorerPatcher: Tools to remove Windows 11 TPM pain and more

Re: What about Windows Updates?

Agreed just because it's not checking, doesn't stop W11 running code that needs TPM/CPU instructions present.

The forced Windows Account install, I agree, is annoying, I prefer to install with a local admin account and add the MS login later, then I crank up UAC to require an admin login

Another VPN quits India, as government proposes social media censorship powers

Call Centres

Is this going to impact India's Call Centre/Tech Support industry? Presume they log stuff anyway, but handing that stuff over to Indian Authorities...

Tweaks to IPv4 could free up 'hundreds of millions of addresses'

Re: far beyond stupid

This would be money minter for consultants akin to the Y2K project?

Broadcom to 'focus on rapid transition to subscriptions' for VMware

Re: Software as service once again

Careful with "Alternatives" - think scale - we're still running some 700 VMs across two sites with site to site failover - ProxMox is KVM/Containers underneath - it's the management toolset that makes it useful, but to what scale?

So main players are VMware/Microsoft Hyper-V/SCVVM (ugh) /OpenStack (Complex) I guess - though VMware probably has most clever tricks in the bag. VMware's main competitor now has to be Azure/AWS?

Don't think you get that far with VMware and no I.T. Wizard (or Hyper-V, etc) - but yes OpenSource needs more effort...

Microsoft revises software licensing, cloud policies amid EU regulator scrutiny

Re: One can dream

And one can dream that running VDI with Windows 11 desktops based on random concurrent users isn't a licencing pig any more!

I know most if not all the workarounds, but you shouldn't need workarounds to avoid licencing issues to do something as obvious as VDI.

Surf the web from your parked Renault: Vivaldi comes to OpenR

Re: Don't get it

Fortunately our 67 plate Outlander PHEV is similar - though the dock is a tray under the armrest where there's also a couple of USB outlets. But about the right balance between a useful touchscreen - does some of the car setup/diagnostics and the radio + car play. Heating is still real switches, volume on steering wheel.

Also has some unnecessary voice controls - guess useful if you are still on a bluetooth phone, but does also let you talk to Siri.

Don't get it

Personally I don't get this mega touchscreen functionality in cars (blaming Musk) - CarPlay and the Android Version I get - for Telephony/Messaging/Music, Podcasts, Sat Nav etc. on a reasonable size screen - 7/8" or so? Each driver brings their own $$$ mobile gadget with their stuff - so why duplicate the whole thing in the car? And then replace all the nice tactile switches with the touchscreen as well?

Yes, I am old (ish).

The sad state of Linux desktop diversity: 21 environments, just 2 designs

Re: The curse of overchoice

You sound like a potential Windows Subsystem for Linux candidate - WSL2 gives you access to all the Linux cmd line toolset - I happen use Debian (from the MS Store) - but since it's not providing the gui the choice of distro is less critical - and you can run multiple distros at the same time if the PC has enough whizz.

If you get to W11 (might still only be for insiders) you get WSLg and that runs X apps on the Windows desktop - so stepping stone to full Linux...

Cars in driver-assist mode hit a third of cyclists, all oncoming cars in tests

Re: So technology works as intended...

Official figures - in the US - so are they reducing shunts on freeways - lots of cars are trundling in the same direction at similar speeds - so clearly a good use case.

Driving around UK B roads, sharing the roads with cyclists, horse riders, tractors, sheep, cows, wild ponys, pheasants (even the odd peacock here abouts) - or around the back streets in our towns - a very long way to go.

Microsoft tests ‘Suggested Actions’ in Windows 11. Insiders: Can we turn it off?

Clippy

Please tell me you can add a Clippy Animation to this...

Microsoft Edge's 'Secure Network' sounds a lot like a built-in VPN

Re: If only home routers could offer a VPN too....

Or any number of alternatives - I've moved to Pfsense (was on a free Sophos offering until I needed IPV6) on a nano PC box - easy to add VPNs to these (I've had point to point and site to site running) - take control of your own firewall!

BTW, this MS offering smells like a bit like Apple's "Private Relay"? Though I expect MS's version will have a corporate element to enable secure BOYD stuff in the browser??

VMware walks back ban on booting vSphere from SD cards or thumb drives

Hardware?

Seems likely the push back will be from Orgs which have a pile of relatively new "built for Vmware" kit which are booting from the internal SD card and with all the disk slots taken up with real storage assigned to VSAN etc, it'd be a major pain to reconfig them all?

At last, Atlassian sees an end to its outage ... in two weeks

Re: We maintain extensive... DMML

Or the Backup System is designed to recover from a System level failure - not deleted individual data sets? So they're having to rebuild a complete system from backups before they can pull the data sets?

Suspect this setup common in cloud land, hence the need for customers to somehow keep backups of their own data sets (read the small print for MS365/Azure for example)

Given the embarrassment caused by this outage, cloud providers need to look at their customer backup/recovery processes?

Day 7 of the great Atlassian outage: IT giant still struggling to restore access

Re: Ah....remember....."cloud" is cheaper......

Cloud isn't cheaper - you're paying for all the bodies to do the hard graft of rebuilding a broken system for you and taking the political flack

The on premises alternative means you having availability of knowledgeable staff (not off sick with Covid/Holiday) plus spares for any server/network tin/data centre pieces/rooms/... and taking the political flack...

Pick your risk profile...

Microsoft debuts System Center 2022

Forgotten Friends?

Seems like MS in the rush to the cloud hoped to get shot of System Centre, but then realised that maybe they couldn't. Stuck some 2022 (ish) sticking plasters on it and pushed it out the door?

Windows 11 growth at a standstill amid stringent hardware requirements

Poor timing

Releasing a new OS with new minimum Hardware requirements just after the World and it's dog spent big on work from home kit is poor timing.

They should roll back a bit to same reqs as 10, maybe just label installs with the new security features enabled with a slightly different brandling or boot screen (and elsewhere) with a security/hardware support rating or some such?

Hooking up to Starlink might be pricier than you thought

BUT - a lot of trenches/pylons already there - phone, water, gas, electricity etc. Musk's just "cashing in" on the isolated communities of the world where no ISP can be bothered to invest... But very much doubt he'll ever see a profit before the satellites start failing...

Unable to write 'Amusing Weekly Column'. Abort, Retry, Fail?

Turbo Pascal - Missing Semi-Colon at line 454

Turbo Pascal back in the day (on an RM 480z IIRC) - if you missed closing a comment, you'd get a "missing semi-colon" (or some other element) at the last line of the program - cause of many a frustration for students!

Zero trust? Not yet a must for most IT departments

ZT on both sides

Problem with ZT is that The premise is that I.T. has ZT in the end user's device, so basically wants to control it (install Agent/Apply Policy/Monitor security) but the end user has ZT in I.T. to allow them to install the agent/apply the policies without impinging on their freedoms.

Same battle as Gov would have by insisting all cars have black boxes to enforce road pricing?

Apple seeks patent for 'innovation' resembling the ZX Spectrum, C64 and rPi 400

ZX81

Predating the Spectrum - I replaced the ZX81 keyboard/case with a "tin box" with proper clackity keys. And if the patent actually says "input device", then a touch screen with a computer in...

Notepad Dark Mode and Android apps arrive on Windows 11

U.S. Only

Seems over in Blighty we may not have it all? So I think my taskbar may have changed - not sure - date on secondary monitor maybe wasn't there before - never noticed. Weather app - turned off all Apps/Widgets - pointless. Notepad is changed (but I use Notepad++ and Visual Studio Code, so meh!). Media Player - nope. Android Stuff nope...

Excitement contained...

Users sound off as new Google Workspace for Education storage limits near

Same just happened with the removal of the "Legacy" F.O.C. workspace.

But dependency on any piece of I.T. is at the mercy of risk of change. Supplier's change stuff, disappear from the market (i.e. get bought by Microsoft), open source developers move on to other projects, leaving orphans.

Bigger the dependency, bigger the risk, and harder any migration/mitigation...

Suspect this move by Google is to try and get money from the big U.S. Universities as they seem $$$ being spent with Microsoft and they're making NO money... Could hit countries like Wales though, we have a single Google tenant (and a Microsoft Tennant!) for all schools in Wales...

Car radios crashed by station broadcasting images with no file extension

Re: Mazda's Infotainment is a pile of garbage

Bits of Wales and other areas much the same - plus since we're on the south coast of Wales, our "coverage" is usually from across the water in north Somerset/Devon - so "local" travel news "INFO" is always useless (to us)

Joint European Torus more than doubles fusion record with 59 megajoules

Lookup...

Lookup, the answer's staring you in the face (weather permitting)!

Much as to appreciate there's a lot of clever engineering and science going into this, you do have to wonder if it will be some completely different solution which eventually delivers practical fusion or other power solutions make it irrelevant?

UK.gov threatens to make adults give credit card details for access to Facebook or TikTok

But no they couldn't have a Covid Pass

The Tory's frothed at the mouth at the idea of a Covid Pass to help get the world back to normal, so people could have some fun at events and bars etc. but they want to effectively implement a "Porn Pass" - got love their priorities...

APNIC: Big Tech's use of carrier-grade NAT is holding back internet innovation

Re: I've said it before and I'll say it again

If anything there were two many mechanisms for transitioning from IPv4 to IPv6 - if they'd been able to set up a set of big public transition gateways or make it easy for ISPs to do so, then we'd have seen faster progress?

SpaceX Starlink sat streaks now present in nearly a fifth of all astronomical images snapped by Caltech telescope

Re: 1800 ish starlinks, but what about the rest?

Starlink's boxes are particularly shiny with regular reflective surfaces - most space junk isn't and is also not in low earth orbit - so generally invisible to astronomers - more of a issue as hazards to other space craft...

The James Webb Space Telescope has only gone and deployed its primary mirror

Re: Excessive - but a Space Camera Drone?

Voyager managed to take detailed pictures of Jupiter, Saturn etc back in 1970s and 80s, pretty sure tech has moved on a bit? Plus we see live images from outside all sorts of rockets, capsules etc.

Be just down to $$$$ for a decent solution?

Excessive - but a Space Camera Drone?

Could a separate camera "drone" be deployed to watch these things - limited lifetime, but useful for both engineers and public spectacle? When done with could be used to knock one of Musk's satellites out "Intergalactic Billiards" style?

The inevitability of the Windows 11 UI: New Notepad enters the beta channel

Another Work Experience Placement

Assuming another Work Experience bod is give Notepad to enhance?

Pretty much everyone replaces it with NP++ or Visual Studio Code - so why bother, some with half the other "apps in the box" - wasting effort - Weather app, News App - sorry I've got a phone/tablet/web site for all that... FOCUS on the OS guys!

Indian government tells Starlink to refund pre-orders placed before licences approved

Still Skeptical

I'm still skeptical of these orbital systems - huge investment to put into place, while trying to avoid crashing into other peoples satellites, a lot of competition on the ground except where the population centers are few and fair between, When is Musk ever expecting to see a profit from this?

Microsoft patches Y2K-like bug that borked on-prem Exchange Server

Re: It's 2022 and we're still coding dates as numbers (badly) or strings (worse)

OOPS started with Simula-67? So in 2021/2 they are bodging strings of numbers to integers because they can even be bothered to write a line of code to convert to seconds...

A third of you slackers out there still aren't using HTTPS by default

Nice to see demise of EV

Enterprise Cert vendors always urked me - all it says is I've paid someone else with a credit card to tell you this site is secure. Really the model should have been I've secured my site, do you trust ME and my own minted root cert!

It's 2021 and someone's written a new Windows 3.x mouse driver. Why now?

MASM

MASM - God I'm old!

Just because you can do it doesn't mean you should: Install Linux on NTFS – on the same partition as Windows

Boot from VHDX

You may be able to add boot from VHDX to the list of ways to multiple boot without the need to partition... Works with Windows VHDX files - not sure about Linux though...

FYI: If the latest Windows 11 really wants to use Edge, it will use Edge no matter what

Re: The problem is simple.

Agreed IOS doesn't really allow other browsers (have to use Webkit/Safari engine) - and since Google launched Chrome book - I believe it's possible to add other browsers, but hard and messy?

So why shouldn't MS be the same?

Given you can choose the OS, you have go with it's limitations (Store, Browser, Built in Apps, Hardware Support etc), why should the browser any different?

System at the heart of scaled-back £30m Sheffield University project runs on end-of-life Oracle database

IIRC the data in SITS does even confirm to basic database design principles - e.g. not even in 3rd normal form - duplicated data all over...

What? Apple products need management?! Cupertino intros device management for SMBs

Re: Free family device management please

It was possible to do that sort of thing with Cisco Meriaki IIRC since it was free for a while - moderately useful. These days I just use the Apple Family tools to approve Apps for the kids,

Would be likewise great if MS included a Family/Intune setup in their MS365 Home product sets

Rolls-Royce set for funding fillip to build nuclear power stations based on small modular reactor technology

Re: Some submarine!

Retired coal/gas fired stations aren't small - so these could form "plug replacements"?

Whilst in favour of a backup to renewables - which can be a bit weather dependent - disposal of the mess is a problem..., IF ONLY they could get Fusion to work...

Starry starry night? No, it's just more low Earth orbit satellites as BT and OneWeb ink deal

Yet more junk

Can we not just have one of these damn networks - already on the verge of ruining the night sky, but its such a waste of resources to duplicate/triplicate etc - China and Russia will no doubt add theirs to the mess too...