Posts by BobChip

Cops put Microsoft Copilot in holding cell after controversial hallucination

Re: Like everybody else, we will NOT be using AI in the future

I will emphatically NOT be using AI anytime in the near future - If ever. I tried using copilot to test some simple synthetic organic chemistry questions. It was wildly inaccurate, to the point of making some positively dangerous suggestions. While utterly wrong, it was also reassuringly confident and certain in its suggestions. It "quotes" nonexistent literature and fantasy references!

If it is this "good" on a topic I know (retired research chemist), I can only imagine that it is equally useless when consulted on any other technical subjects like law - a legal colleague has already confirmed this to me.

This technology is far too dangerous to be released for general use, now or best never. Critical thinking has never been so vital! Sadly, a skill not common amongst a great many internet users.

On the credit side, it is so bad that it makes student plagiarism in essays and course work (cheating) laughably easy to detect.

Notepad will now tell you all the ways Microsoft has enshittified it

Bumswipe?

Fine! Provided you get to choose the paper first....... Just beware of MS's well known tendency to excessive slop....

Green crayon?

I think you meant RED crayon, surely?

Windows 11 still barely pulling ahead of 10 despite end-of-support push

NOT a "courtesy" detail

MS bloat and clutter can only be seen as "courtesy details" through the eyes of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation. With apologies to Douglas Adams.

Re: What about moving to Linux?

I personally know of three in my immediate neighbourhood. They "upgraded" to Win 11 and detested it. On asking me if they should revert to Win 10 or??? I offered to move them to Mint 22.2. They are now more than happy with this (speed, stability, ease of use, very fast updates etc..) and after 3 to 4 months using Linux have no desire to use anything made by MS ever again. I have now helped about 15 home computer users to transition to Mint over the last 6 years. Significantly, not one of them has reverted to MS.

A drop in the ocean? Yes. Not honestly "data" at all, in the sense of a serious study. But I know my experience is not unique. It has been supported by many other posts in this forum in the last 6 months.

So not a study, certainly, but perhaps indicative of a trend? I bet there is enough "anecdotal data" already out there to start plotting trends.... Maybe I'll start digging and then polish up my (50 year old) uni math and statistics. See where it takes me.

Windows 11 needs an XP SP2 moment, says ex-Microsoft engineer

Re: Windows 11 is pretty bad

I am with you on this. It is FAR easier to sort out a Linux bug than a Win (10 or 11 - you pick) bug. Mainly because Linux online help files and forums tend to offer helpful - and mostly concise and accurate - advice. Unlike MS "resources". I would far rather have to resort to the Terminal / command line in a Linux OS than in anything made by Microsoft. Just my personal IMHO

International Criminal Court kicks Microsoft Office to the curb

Re: Bye, it was nice to know you

Drop MS software? I did so years ago and now claim my pint!

End of Windows 10 support is the perfect time for the Windows 11 installer to fail

Punishment?

I gritted my teeth, and took my punishment on the chin. I actually enjoyed it, and continue to do so........

Hundreds of millions of business PCs are still on Windows 10 as D-Day nears

Irresponsible?

Irresponsible? Certainly so. But not without consequences..... "Most governments are dependent? on Microsoft services". But by no means all, and maybe not for so much longer?

Microsoft insists Copilot+ PCs are 'empowering the future' – reality disagrees

Transformative change?

For once, MS have got it right! There will be a transformative change!

It's the final countdown: Windows 10 hits end of support in less than 30 days

So What?

So what? Nothing will stop or break for me. I repurposed my mostly unused 1 Tb Win 10 SSD to Mint 22.2 last week. Remind me someone -- what was Microsoft? On second thoughts, WHY was Microsoft??

Ex-White House cyber, counter-terrorism guru: Microsoft considers security an annoyance, not a necessity

Trust! - and the complete loss of trust.

As I observed here recently, it all comes down to trust and confidence. M$ have now completely lost ANY reason to expect our trust and confidence. Indeed, they seem determined to make matters worse with every iteration of their OS. I simply cannot believe that ALL M$ employees, C suite strategists, marketers, designers etc. are so dense that they cannot see this. Arrogance? wilful ignorance? contempt? None of these conclusions does them any credit. They certainly do not deserve our hard earned money for this risk-laden rubbish

Network scans find Linux is growing on business desktops, laptops

Re: Coluld be good, could be bad?

Sadly, ANY security is at risk once a system gets into the hands of users. I doubt that any system can ever be made both truly useful AND completely user-proof.

Make Redmond angry by setting up Windows 11 with a local account

Re: Dairy cows?

Unfair to farmers. Farmers really value their cows, and take great care to look after them well for the long term. An unhealthy (AKA unhappy) cow does not produce nearly as much milk as a happy one. Strangely, a dead one produces no milk at all, today or tomorrow.

M$ would far rather kill the cow to get more milk today, than moderate their behaviour in order to get a little milk every day for years to come. I suspect their long term position is now well past recovery. However, I don't see their decline and demise as a cause for concern, and I don't propose to worry about it. (P.S. I no longer hold any M$ stock....)

Real estate agents use the power of AI to command plumbing, layout to disappear

Heads Up!

So this is where AI takes us... Possibly the most important story El Reg has ever published. Well done chaps, and keep it up.

When hyperscalers can’t safeguard one nation’s data from another, dark clouds are ahead

Re: Air Gap

I prepare client sensitive (planning) plans and drawings on a Linux system.

1 Internet access is OFF while I am working. Whole desktop is completely airgapped.

2 Work is saved to an external USB HDD. If needed, I will create a temporary directory on the external drive to store work in progress, or useful files copied from the desktop.

3 Finished work is copied from HDD to USB / DVD, and then delivered to the client BY HAND. No emails, file transfers etc..

4 HDD is safely unmounted.

5 Machine is restarted with internet enabled, to permit system updates, searches etc.

6 Desktop is checked for any residual data, copy and paste files or informative emails etc, to be properly cleaned / deleted. Nothing sensitive is stored on the desktop. Ever.

7 On request, the external HDD is either overwritten or handed to the client. NOTHING is left in my hands, except for paper records.

Is all this too extreme? If it sounds like a lot of work, it is. Plus quite a lot of forethought and care in carrying out. But it provides a level of privacy and security which my clients obviously appreciate. I get repeat work.

No clouds for me, thank you!

Microsoft promises to eventually make WinUI 'truly open source'

Re: Other US's?

BETTER US's are available. Nuf said.

Tested: Microsoft Recall can still capture credit cards and passwords, a treasure trove for crooks

Trust is gone!

Trust is totally GONE!! This is the key point, and quite frankly the only point worth bothering about. Microsoft seem to be (suicidally?) determined to make matters worse. I do not use anything made by M$ now, and have no intention of ever doing so again in the future. Win 8 was the last straw for me.

BOFH: Deepfake or just an idiot? We'll need an audit to confirm

Re: Access help.......

Way back in the 70s... If your phone stops working, just ring our help line from the number that has stopped working..... Seriously! They still live among us....

You DO see Windows 11 as an AI PC opportunity, say Dell and Intel

A gateway?

To Hell!

No thanks.

Windows 11 is a minefield of micro-aggressions in the shipping lane of progress

Saving Microsoft from itself?

Saving Microsoft from itself .... looks like..

1 Much too late. Should have seen this coming more than a decade ago.

2 Self contradictory - MS is evidently determined on a course of self-destruction, and is deaf to all criticism.

3 Endorsing too many bad decisions - such as AI in all your drinking water.

4 A waste of effort, as in "is there anything actually worth saving at all?"

The drift away from MS may be slow, but there can be no doubt about the direction in which the arrow is pointing. And it is gathering speed. I doubt that there is anything that MS can now do to reverse the trend.

Remember that nothing lasts for ever

Re: Just don't use Windows

Yes, life without Windows is not only possible, but it is a very much better life all round. It does not matter too much which alternative you use, provided that you avoid M$ Windows.

If I were a doctor, and M$ were my patient, I would be seriously worried that they were showing suicidal tendencies. Fortunately I am not a doctor, and their eventual suicide will not cause me any concern. I might even get bored waiting for it to happen. Even though it may be inevitable, and the outcome abundantly obvious, I don't expect it to happen overnight. Large animals usually take a long time to die after their final malaise has been diagnosed. I will rely on The Register to keep me updated.

Copilot Vision on Windows 11 sends data to Microsoft servers

Re: "AI is changing the way we use our PCs,"...

To be honest, it was Win 8 that did it for me. It deprecated a very expensive film scanner and an expensive large format drawing office printer. MS response at the time was to suggest I "just" replace them with hardware which was "Win 8 compatible" - about £3k even then; vastly more today. I was then astonished to discover that all this hardware still worked perfectly under Ubuntu. Guess what I did

It is fair to say that MS FORCED me to move to Linux. This article is simply the latest example of the same thing. Are MS so desperate to "succeed" with their concept of AI that they have lost all focus on their customers? And will therefore lose them because of this "obsession"? If so, they deserve what they get.

Microsoft fixes the ESU blues for Windows 10 users

Re: Paid for?

I hate to remind you that M$$ products were never "paid for", as in bought and now your property for ever. Read the MS EULA. It is explicit that you do NOT OWN the software. You bought a license to use the software for (an indeterminate? period of time? I have never found anything resembling clarification on this.) The MS business model is driven by the need for constant monetisation, by whatever means possible. With a M$ OS on your machine, it is really a bit of a moot point as to whether you truly own "your" hardware either, as it is mostly the OS that determines how you use it and what you can do with it.

You do not have to ask which OS I switched to more than a decade ago..........

What if Microsoft just turned you off? Security pro counts the cost of dependency

Can't even login?

Not a problem with Linux systems, which the USER controls. Wonder if that is the real (orange) reason why the US military have what is probably the largest installed Linux user base in the world....?

We're number 1! Windows 11 finally overtakes Windows 10

Win 11 is finally No. 1

Microsoft have finally achieved what they have been trying to do for decades!

Congratulations!!

You have now won the race to complete irrelevance!!!

Impact of Microsoft taking over Enterprise Account renewals starts to 'bite'

do not want their customers moving...

Tough cookies M$. Like King Canute, the tide has turned and there is now no stopping it.

Former and current Microsofties react to the latest round of layoffs

Reluctance of customers to adopt?

Not so sure about that. The small community I work in and with seems to be increasingly a Linux one. More to the point, of all the colleagues who have "gone Linux" over the last three years, not a single one has reverted to M$. OK, it is hardly a landslide, but the arrow is clearly pointing in one direction only.

UK eyes new laws as cable sabotage blurs line between war and peace

Passing a couple of laws would do the trick......

Really?? When was the last time(s!) you drove faster than the posted speed limit? And got away with it?

Law by itself achieves nothing - it is aggressive and continuous enforcement that makes laws effective. Governments of all stripes, in almost all countries, have consistently ignored this simple fact for decades. Because at the end of the day passing impressive sounding legislation costs almost nothing compared to actually enforcing it.

ex. member UKELA (now retired)

Critics blast Microsoft's limited reprieve for those stuck on Windows 10

Re: What I’d like to know…

No need to know anything - from now on. I have (or used to have) a copy of Win 10 on a 2 Tb SSD in a multi-system machine which can run any one of up to 5 OSs by way of SATA power switches selected on boot up. The other 4 drives run Linux or other nix OSs. I could easily run Win 11 if I wanted to do so. I don't! I kept a Win 10 setup just for the occasional - and now increasingly rare Win project and some old games. Having observed the way in which MS is aggressively pushing an increasingly unattractive working environment, I have had enough. 2 days ago, I finally finished a small project that required a Win system to complete it. I do not expect to be asked to do any more in the future - that market has vanished. Today I reformatted the Windows drive and installed a fresh copy of Linux Mint. A much better use of a 2Tb SSD, IMHO.

My entire workspace is now free from anything made by M$, and is completely hassle free as well. My entire (small) business runs smoothly and easily on Linux, and much more securely now as well.

Just ditch Windows and discover just how much simpler and more agreeable life becomes!

The year of the European Union Linux desktop may finally arrive

Re: Web apps

We seem to be moving quite quickly to an era in which the actual OS on the machine in front of you will be irrelevant, PROVIDED THAT you can access and use the apps / creative software / databases / communications you need on line. As Microsoft have already realised (and have done for quite some time) the money is to be made from selling cloud services, not operating systems.

The big questions now become :-

Who do you trust to support / maintain the business-critical remote software your business relies on to make and market your product?

Who do you trust with your critical intellectual property?

What will it cost?

Microsoft - particularly inf the context of Trump's America - seems to have universally failed on the trust issue. Almost everything else is secondary. Trust, if anything, will be what drives any changes.

This is why the sensitive designs / drawings I create for clients are created on an internet disabled machine, backed up on a separate air-gapped HDD, and are finally passed on by hand on dvd or memory stick. I make sure there is nothing sensitive left on my (Mint) machine when I enable an internet connection for update and maintenance purposes. My clients not only appreciate the level of security I can offer, but some will insist on it. Fortunately, Linux systems make this easy to manage.

My "cloud" is my very secure desktop and separate HDD. It is a hassle, no question, but it is necessary and it works for me.

Newbie...

30 years! You were an early adopter! I have only just turned 20 years as a user - first on Ubuntu and now on Mint. Don't know what I will be using in 10 years from now, but I know it will still be some flavour of Linux or something else with Nix roots. It will not be anything made by M$, that's for sure.

China orders trial of aged care robots that can cook, clean, and provide emotional support

Aged Care Robots?

So soon already! A potential use for redundant / retired robots. How very ecological.

1.5 TB of James Webb Space Telescope data just hit the internet

Re: COMMUNISM!

That's a little harsh - they are scientists, not MS. Science may be very competitive, but at the end of the day it is still all about sharing data.

Microsoft pulls MS365 Business Premium from nonprofits

Re: It's a pain - but there is a better solution

Can't use LibreOffice? Why not? People in my working group - 50 + in our local network - use MS, Linux and Apple OSs, and their office suites, all the time to create and exchange documents without any difficulty. Just take care to watch your save and send formats before you commit.

If you are a free agent, have another look. If you are constrained by a "big brother" business policy............ well hard luck.

Windows 11 market share stalls ahead of Windows 10 cutoff

Re: Landfill

While some computers undoubtedly will end up in landfill, I should like to think that the majority will either be recycled (materials recovery) or repurposed (given a new life with a new OS). The "end of 10" ought to imply a large supply of very cheap (and often very powerful) second hand machines with years of useful life left in them, for those who have the wit to take advantage of the opportunity to grab one. (I have just spent £40 locally on a very high spec pre-owned Dell laptop for my wife, now revitalised with Linux Mint).

All this depends on corporates not wanting to completely write off the asset value invested in these machines, to somewhat offset the cost of buying the new ones, AND someone to take the time and trouble to "clean" them before releasing them to the second hand market. Sadly, I suspect that the cost of cleaning up will win out, until the penny drops and someone realises that this will have to be done anyway, for compliance reasons.

Compliance sledgehammer (too smashed up for economic materials recovery) followed by landfill after all......?

Wish I wasn't an optimist.......

Microsoft dumps AI into Notepad as 'Copilot all the things' mania takes hold in Redmond

Re: Smells of desperation

Desperation indeed. But paying for it? No I am not! I went Linux years ago.

NASA keeps ancient Voyager 1 spacecraft alive with Hail Mary thruster fix

Re: Remember, the best protection from small explosions is.....CORRECTION

The best protection from ALL explosions is distance. Lots and lots of distance.

There.

FIFY

Microsoft set to pull the plug on Bing Search APIs in favor of AI alternative

Ditching Bing

Yet another reason (on top of many existing ones) to abandon Micro$$t for good. I have already done so, and feel so much more productive, comfortable and secure as a result. I will never be going back to anything made or pushed by MS

The 'End of 10' is nigh, but don't bury your PC just yet

Linux alternatives

Yes, LibreOffice is very good. GIMP is quite a reasonable alternative to Photoshop - yes, it works differently to Photoshop, and there will be a learning curve, but to date I have yet to find any task which I used to do in Photoshop which cannot be done just as well in GIMP. Inkscape is a very powerful vector graphics package like Illustrator. I used to be considered a Corel Draw power user, and now regard Inkscape as a good (even if not quite as good) alternative to Corel. I always preferred Corel to Illustrator, but that probably reflects familiarity and the type of work I was doing, as much as the respective merits of each package. But Inkscape is good and, like Libre Office and GIMP, it is free.

Xcode I don't know enough about to comment on, and while there are decent basic (free) CAD packages available for Linux, I would agree that there is (as yet) nothing available to compete with the power of Autocad. I understand that it can be run in Linux using Codeweavers Crossover, but I have no personal experience of this.

To sum up, my personal decision in the face of the imminent demise of a usable Windows system is to switch to Linux. Not only do I move to an infinitely more user-friendly, stable, easy to maintain, nag free OS, but I also recover a nice 2Tb SS hard drive which I can put to much better use. No brainer.

What price Windows 11 / 12 now?

Windows 11 market share falls despite Microsoft ad blitz

Re: Maybe Microsoft should go back to making just an O.S.

Someone else already does make "just an OS". Two of them. Apple and Linux. The choice is yours.

The Telegraph jumps the gun on World War III

War of the Worlds again?

Remember Orson Welles (I think?) and his 1938 spoof radio broadcast claiming that "the Martians have landed". It caused amazing panic at the time, no doubt because of his sober gravitas. I bet it is still out there somewhere on the internet... But responsible?? Really??

Microsoft moved the goalposts once. Will Windows 12 bring another shift?

Re: moved to Linux

One big step?

No. Not really. In one sense, only about 30 minutes to go double boot - or for a complete install. In another sense, a couple of days or so to adapt to the new, FAST, secure environment.

I was FORCED to take this step when Windows 8 deprecated hundreds of pounds worth of expensive peripherals which had worked perfectly under Windows 7, but which to my considerable surprise still worked beautifully under Ubuntu. No further explanation or justification needed. MS response had been "just go out and buy all new kit compatible with Win 8 (and stop being a nuisance..)"

I continue to watch MS's "progress" with the same fascination as watching a disaster movie. You know what is coming....... but not quite when.

20% discount offer on Windows 365 expires around same time as Windows 10 support

Re: A tempting deal

If I had said that every time I'd advised someone to "go Linux" I would have run out of fingers years ago. I have of course taken my own advice. Very happy Minty penguin now.

Windows isn't an OS, it's a bad habit that wants to become an addiction

Re: Windows and I...

It was Windows 8 (2012, I think) that did it for me. It deprecated several very expensive peripherals - film scanner etc.. - which I then found, to my enormous surprise and astonishment, were perfectly well supported by Ubuntu. I started out on dual boot, but within a few months the boot logs told me that I was no longer using Windows at all. Now I work entirely in Linux, and have never had any cause to regret it.

I was not "persuaded or drawn" to switch to Linux. Microsoft FORCED me to jump. Probably the only thing for which I am ever going to be genuinely grateful to Microsoft.....

It is by no means an OS landslide, but I find myself increasingly working in partnership with other designers and businesses who have also switched to Linux. More significantly, none of them have gone back to Microsoft.

Microsoft blames 'latent code issue' after Windows 11 upgrades sneak past admin blockades

Microsoft will stop at nothing.......

I recognise the above title statement to be demonstrably true. And it is not just Microsoft playing this game. I also find it deeply concerning - meaning I do not like it and "will stop at nothing" to prevent it from impacting me. My solution may seem drastic, but it is relatively simple and very effective:-

1 Linux

2 Have nothing to do with Microsoft; in particular Office 365 or anything else linked to cloud storage. Sorry Google, but that mostly applies to you too...

3 As far as possible, treat your computer as an air-gapped stand alone device, where you store your sensitive data. Make air gapped backup (external HDD) a habit. You ought to be doing this anyway.

4 I recognise the need to use the internet. For this I use a cheap - almost "disposable" Chromebook, and a clean, reformatted USB data stick for data transfer between this and my isolated desktop when necessary.

5 Software updates (fast and easy on Linux) are managed by enabling WiFi for only the few minutes needed. This minimises the risk of intrusion.

I appreciate that for a lot of users this is going back to the stone age. I would only point out that the stone age was much simpler to keep secure, and that no one tried (as much) to monetise your every last keystroke.

Inconvenient? Less so than you might think. It is as much about working habits as anything else. And the people for whom I prepare sensitive plans and drawings are clear that they very much appreciate the level of security and privacy I can offer.

April's Patch Tuesday leaves unlucky Windows Hello users unable to login

Re: Windows Hello, Windows Goodbye!

Hello Linux. Simples

'Copilot will remember key details about you' for a 'catered to you' experience

Re: I don't need bloat!

I read years ago - probably in this forum - that the purpose of an OS was to facilitate the user in doing productive work.

M$ has not done that since - IMHO - Win 7. It has consistently focused on "owning" your machine and, as far as (in)humanly possible, monetising every keystroke you make. This is why I chose the Linux route more than a decade ago, and, having recently had to try to do useful work on a Win 11 machine - on another machine in another work environment - I have come to realise just how bad Windows has become.

I do not want or need to become a Linux "evangelist". Microsoft are far more effective than I will ever be....

Re: Where will Copilot store its memories ?

Nowhere near me, or any of my machines. Ever. (Penguin in the room, or rather, a whole flock of them..) I have belonged to the Spheniscidae clan for almost 20 years, and continue to enjoy robust and secure good health.

HP Inc settles printer toner lockout lawsuit with a promise to make firmware updates optional

Re: Update optional?

Expressed a little more clearly (or directly) my next replacement printer will NOT be made by HP. A replacement is imminent, as my very elderly (but hitherto very reliable) HP LaserJet m401d is clearly dying. Thanks to El Reg for the timely advice. Canon ink tank looks like a good choice, as they all come with full function Linux drivers. (penguin in the room....)

To be honest, I think my HP problem boils down to all the toner / print units now being re-manufactured old stock - polish it up a bit, put more toner in, repackage and sell again. No prime new stock available - almost certainly no longer being made-, and the elderly green photosensitive cylinder has a limited working life. It was a good machine while it lasted, and probably still would be if supplied with decent quality toner units, but after about 20(?) years and goodness knows how many toner units I really have no grounds at all for complaint.

Time to move on to newer technology..., but it will not be HP.