Posts by David 132

Mind-blowing secrets of NSA's security exploit stockpile revealed at last

████ ██████.████ █████████ █████ ███████ ██████

████ ██████.████ █████████ █████ ███████ ██████

Yes, but did the goat die?

Microsoft backports data slurp to Windows 7 and 8 via patches

Re: I was just musing the other day that M$ might do this and low and behold!

Oh come on! Don't have a cow!

Charolais you can't be serious.

(Ok, ok, I admit I'm scraping the barrel now. Enough.)

Re: I was just musing the other day that M$ might do this and low and behold!

Enough with the cheesy jokes!

Au lait off them you mean?

Re: I was just musing the other day that M$ might do this and low and behold!

I also feel behooven to point out that only cattle low.

You're going to milk this for all it's worth, aren't you?

Re: Unfortunately

Over time people who care influence those that do not (or to a lesser degree).

Indeed. Is it fair to say that the Reg commentards tend to be IT influencers, either within their companies or at least their families/friends?

At the risk of sounding insufferably pompous, I am the "go to" person for IT questions for my relatives, friends, and many of my colleagues. Whatever my opinion - right or wrong - that'll be their guidance. So as I'm lukewarm on Windows 10, that means a whole circle of other people have inherited the same attitude. Probably 30-40 people in total are now putting their Windows 10 updates on hold, based on my "wait and see" guidance.

My point is that.. yes, you can argue that we are unrepresentative of the market at large. That we're nerds, whiners, ivory-tower techies, or whatever. But we do often have a disproportionate amount of influence.

As I've said before, I think Microsoft's biggest and earliest mistake was to allow Windows 10 feedback from only those beta-testers who agreed to sign in with a Microsoft ID. Then and there, they excluded feedback from anyone who might have concerns about privacy and data-gathering. So now the OS is released, all this fuss is kicking up, and Microsoft - let's give them the benefit of the doubt - are sitting there wondering "why are so many people upset? We never had any inkling of this during the beta phase!"

Re: nsatc.net

D'oh. In my rush to make a Funny I got my TLAs confused.

Thanks for the correction. Technically correct - the best kind of correct.

Re: nsatc.net

For myself, having just nslookup'd nsatc.net with a bunch of different public dns's, from both home and work, I find they all resolve to 127.0.0.1 (!)

Is this new?

Depends. Are you posting from Langley, Virginia?

Re: KB3068708 very slow to complete uninstall

c.f. Silverlight, the monthly security scanner tool (no option that says "I don't want to ever run this tool, not this month, not next month either"), etc.

Re: Hackintosh?

And the other factor, one that people never seem to take into account when complaining about the expense of Apple kit, is that resale/residual values tend to be very high.

Take my wife's old iMac for example - 24", 2007. Still fetching upwards of 250 quid on eBay. Not that it matters, because it still works very well and seems perfectly speedy - I just updated Bootcamp from XP to Windows 7. Last I checked, a PC of that age would be landfill.

So yes, the Apple tax is painful, but at least you get a goodly chunk of it back when you sell.

Re: I was just musing the other day that M$ might do this and low and behold!

Pardon my pedantry, but the phrase is "Lo and behold".

And I agree with your comment.

Thanks for the heads-up.

No doubt all three of these are described in the Windows Update client as "Resolves issues with Windows" or something equally vague.

Yes, obviously any IT administrator worthy of the name should be carefully evaluating and analysing every WU patch to determine its relevance, but it's getting to the point that every home user and their grandma has to do the same. Gone are the days when one could reflexively hit "install all", with the assumtion that Newer Code = Better; simply can't trust the patches to be for your benefit rather than Microsoft's any more. Yes, you could argue that "well, anyone sensible should be evaluating and carefully reading every patch anyway"...but no, home users have more important things to worry about. To use an analogy, I don't have to carefully read the small print before & after taking my car for it's scheduled service, just in case the dealership decided to install a data-logger for their benefit.

It's not so much the data-slurping, it's the fact that Microsoft seem to be going out of their way to do it in as sneaky and surreptitious way as possible, handing ammunition to the privacy nuts and haters. I mean, if it's all so innocent, why not be more up-front about it?

Ed Snowden crocked cloud, says VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger

Blame where it's due.

Seems unfair to blame Snowden - the blame surely lies with the various countries' spy agencies and their all-your-data-is-belong-to-us attitude.

All Snowden did was make it very, very clear what was going on. It's up to each of us now to make the judgement call - either "eh, everyone spies on everyone else, it's a fact of life, deal with it"... or "store my valuable data in the cloud? Why wouldn't I just save time and mail it directly to GCHQ/NSA/...? No way José!" according to preference/paranoia level.

Nano – meet her: AMD's Radeon R9 4K graphics card for non-totally bonkers gamers, people

I've tried several times to parse the title of this article, but I can't make any sense of it whatsoever.

At! least! it! wasn't! one! of! those! tedious! Yahoo! headlines!

Windows 10 blamed (partly) for stalled PC sales recovery

Re: Offerings

HP still does not have the WiGig stuff.

The HP 1011 X2 G1 does - it's a Core M based detachable 2-in-1 with vPro and 802.11ad (WiGig).

Works wonderfully with the HP Advanced Wireless Dock.

I've done extensive testing of WiDock on this hardware combination; ask me if you need any more info.

Twenty years since Windows 95, and we still love our Start buttons

Re: I remember Windows 95, too

The music video was Edie Brickell and New Bohemians singing Good Times.

Also Weezer - Buddy Holly - if I recall correctly, that was on the Windows 95 Plus Pack CD, or maybe it was on the CD edition of Windows 95 itself?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kemivUKb4f4

The animator Bill Plympton did a Windows 95 spot too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAb3uVpf_v0

Again, I think that was on the Plus Pack CD.

Intel's Compute Sticks stick it to Windows To Go, Chromecast

Re: pricing?

But it voids the warranty. And also, does it support MBR booting over USB or just UEFI/GPT?

I checked on an ICS I have here. UEFI only. Secure boot can be disabled, but no (apparent) provision for installing new keys - only re-installing the Intel platform key.

Re: All it needs is the herb compartment

Personally I think it more resembles a Kazoo.

My dog thanks you both for your kind job offers, but has asked me to point out that my original comment was merely an attempt at a droll observation on the similarity between any given Perl script and random keyboard-mashing gibberish.

Besides, I don't think he's cut out for a programming job - being a labrador, he's smelly, hairy, tends to drool and slobber a lot, is wildly enthusiastic about any random crap he finds, has no social skills, and wants to hump everything in sight.

Oh, wait. Never mind.

Re: power button

I considered one of these for the downstairs wall-mounted TV to keep things tidy, but how do you press the power button when needed?

I believe there's a BIOS switch to "power on when AC power is restored" (or words to that effect), so you can switch it on and off with the TV power.

Re: Re:you are the US No-Fly list.

Sounds like a result tome....

Typo? Or inadvertent witticism?

"Is he on the no-fly list? Did he fail the security screening? Come to me, my TSA minions! Bring me the *dun-dun-dun* Result Tome! Or the Bad People Grimoire! Or the Once-Unfavorably-Compared-Us-To-The-Stasi Palimpsest!"

Yeah but how many of those 5000 were you running a Perl script?

My dog just stepped heavily on the keyboard. It's entirely possible he just wrote that Perl script.

Re: Simply appalling!

Could Intel explain why they have to produce a separate, crippled hardware version for Linux ? To me it would seem much more efficient to manufacture one single hardware model and load any OS they might please since it's no big deal.

Embedded / digital signage customers who want the lowest possible cost and won't pay for extra flash storage or RAM that they're not going to use (kind of a big deal if you're buying thousands of these things).

It's not about "crippled hardware for Linux" - if you want to run (a supported variant of) Linux on the better unit, there's nothing stopping you. As I mentioned in a comment above, the "Windows 8.1 for Bing" edition on the ICS is provided by Microsoft at no cost to OEMs (AFAIK), so you need have no worry that by purchasing the 32GB/2GB unit and subsequently installing Linux, you're still contributing to Microsoft's coffers.

Re: oh deary me

Don't loose your temper over it (he said with baited breathe).

I could care less.

Note for the sarcasm-impaired: there are 4 deliberate spelling/phrase errors above, agreeing with David Lawrence and Ru' and parodying the diabolical standard of written English on the intertubes. If, and only if you find more than 4, then feel free to laugh at me.

Re: Windows... for Bing?

It's Windows Home with Bing set as the default search engine and in a couple of other places. The supposed subsequent search traffic/revenue to Microsoft allows them to offer the OS free-as-in-beer to OEMs for small, low power devices (I think the criteria are something like "2GB ram or less, up to 32GB storage").

So

1) no "windows tax" on this device

2) there's nothing to stop you setting the search back to Google/DDG/whatever, or installing Firefox, or even zapping the OS and installing some variant of Linux.

As someone mentioned briefly above, the BIOS has a "Boot OS" option which offers only Windows 8.1 32bit or Ubuntu (14.04 LTS x64, IIRC). I suspect that is because those are the only two SecureBoot keys present. Whether you can disable SB or install new keys, or indeed whether that BIOS option affects the Boot OS in some other way, I haven't checked. Can find out if anyone's interested.

Re: The masses are capricious...

Plus they have threatened to throw me out of the cross dressing, furries rubber ropes and and manacles flower arranging club

"Oh my, Vicar. Such a delightful arrangement of dahlias. And what an unusual place to put them.

Is it not a little uncomfortable?"

And in the first generation we saw the WiFi and the Bluetooth interfere with each other which resulted in lags in one or the other.

Fixed by a BIOS update, in case anyone is reading this article and thinking "I tried the ICS and the wifi performance was dire".

Two weeks of Windows 10: Just how is Microsoft doing?

Re: @ Clatters

i knew airwaves were powerful but this is amazing news

Yeah, he was probably on Werthers Originals before, hence the upgrade to Mint.

Re: "Despite these concerns..."

Oh, Trevor. Upvoted if only for the immortal phrase that is

A rubber dick with a wig on it is a more acceptable productivity platform than Windows 8

That is a mental image that will stay with me for a while. Thanks.

Not to mention raising scary questions about what constitutes "productivity" in the Reg offices.

Pirate MEP: Microsoft's walled garden is no consumer pleasure park

Re: RTFM

the new T&Cs “respect individual privacy and don’t require a law degree to read”.

What part of "sell your soul to the devil" do you not understand?

War is peace.

Freedom is slavery.

Ignorance is strength.

Snooping on you respects your privacy.

Windows 10. It's doubleplusgood (...for governments).

In hindsight, the first clue for us was when the "My Computer" icon got renamed after Windows 7.

It's not "My Computer" any more, it's Microsoft's, to do with as they will. I just get to use it, by their good grace.

Re: For blank-reg

Cavemen also use tar & make

Thag not like tar. Tar trap Thag pet mammoth. Tar make Thag angry.

Thag thump hard drive wit' club to make bit patterns.

How Thag do shell? Bash.

Hey, folks. Meet the economics 'genius' behind Jeremy Corbyn

Re: At least you declared an interest this time

Don't worry Tim. I'm pretty sure that in this case "abusive" means "doesn't accord with my political prejudices".

See also:

Mean old Tories do things "for ideological reasons" whereas the cuddly Left do things "because we're principled".

Aussie bloaters gorging on junk food 'each and every day'

Re: I'm conflicted...

Ketchup is also apparently one of the vital ingredients in an Australian pie floater^^: pea soup, drop a pie in it, garnish with tomato sauce.

As delightfully referenced by Pratchett in The Last Continent as the "Meat pie floater" (don't ask WHAT meat).

In Americanese, 'floater' is either a police term for a dead body found in water, or an immature term for buoyant material in a toilet.

Or, apparently, "a company employee at a tradeshow who is assigned the duty of 'floating' between areas of the booth". Leastways, that's how the 'merkin company I work for uses it. Being told by the septics, upon arrival at London Olympia, that colleagues and I were "floaters" used to raise many a juvenile snigger.

Beer, because beer + meat pie... mmmm...

Re: 'religious stretching'

Does this involve nuns and a rack of some sort?

As in, "I was taut by nuns"?

Or perhaps religious stretching is this "Cross-fit" thing I keep hearing about?

BTW, damn that's a delicious looking pie in the header photo for the article. Mmm, hungry now.

Microsoft vacates moral high ground for the data slurpers' cesspit

+1 upvote for the Black Books reference.

"There was a little man in his hair!"

This comments thread is missing something

Where're the likes of 'Dogged' to tell us how we're stupid luddite reactionaries who are banging on about something totally inconsequential that only linux-loving freetards care about?

But less facetiously... is there anyone around who would care to offer a thoughtful, reasoned, non ad-hominem argument as to why this data-gathering behaviour of Windows 10 is no big deal?

I'd be interested to hear the counter-arguments.

I called this two months ago

I posted on the Reg forums almost two months ago:

http://forums.theregister.co.uk/forum/1/2014/10/02/BigAndos_Windows_10_Preview_First_Impressions/

...about these very things. The fact that at every turn in Windows 10, if there's a "good, privacy-respecting" way to implement something, and a "sinister, scoop up all your data" way... Microsoft seem to have chosen the latter.

I like some aspects of Windows 10. The UI, I must confess, looks smarter and cleaner than Windows 7. The underlying OS seems to be faster.

But why the all-pervasive data-slurping?

Windows 10 wipes your child safety settings if you upgrade from 7 or 8

Re: The quoted article comments are basically...

We all know that porn is found in bushes.

And the other way round, too. Fnaaaar.

Don't want Windows 10 FILTH on the company network? Step this way

Re: I think

String them up by their figgins.

'Fix these Windows 10 Horrors': Readers turn their guns on Redmond

Re: Selected "Decline" license agreement but Win 10 still tries to install!!!

Attempts to rename GWX.exe and GWXUXWorker.exe failed due to TrustInstall restrictions regardless of my Admin access.

Admin doesn't really mean "admin" any more, not since Windows 7. You know, to protect you from accidentally feeling like you're the one in control of your PC.

You'll need to take ownership of the GWX* files, then give yourself Full Control permissions, then delete them (might need to kill them from the Task Manager first). Then delete the scheduled tasks that launch GWX*.

No, Aoyagi Aichou, you're not the only one.

I find the excessive cutesiness of the error messages since Windows 8 to be really twee, naff, and patronising.

The BSOD is now a frowny face :( - translation, "your computer's crashed but we think you're too dumb to understand so we'll use baby talk... Ouchie I Got A Boo-Boo"

Try pairing a Miracast/wireless display device from the TIFKAM Settings app - if it doesn't work you don't get a meaningful error message or pointers to what might have been the cause. Instead, just a patronising "That didn't work".

As another commentard said elsewhere.. Microsoft appear to think that there are precisely two types of user in the world. Home users, who are dumb and stupid and need to be spoon-fed and have everything done for them...and Enterprise users, who can pay volume licensing fees and can be treated like grown-ups.

Windows 10: A sysadmin speaks his brains – and says MEH

Re: Screw Windows 10!

CBMVic20 - all good points, with the exception of

Inevitable subscription model to "rent" the OS after a year? Check

Microsoft have made it pretty clear on multiple occasions that there will be no subscription model for Windows 10. If you take the free upgrade offer - any time between today and July 29, 2016 - you have Windows 10 free "for the supported lifetime of the device". There are many reasons to dislike Windows 10, but let's not make up more. There's also many reasons to like the OS, too, believe it or not.

The problem being, of course, that they've also said "this will be the last version of Windows", which implies that over that supported lifetime of the device the OS you're using will evolve into Windows 10.1, 10.2, 10.3.Net, 10.5.Cloud Edition, 10.5.5 Mandatory DRM Enforcement Edition... automatically, remorselessly, and without you having any say in the matter. Redmond will NOT listen to our plaintive cries of "But I liked it how it was yesterday!!"

But I agree wholeheartedly with your other points, and have upvoted you.

Re: 4000 browser tabs

Commentards are vicious, remorseless internet piranhas that enjoy nothing better than tearing writers' very souls apart for the smallest mistake.

Aw, shucks. Stop it. You're making me blush.

I'm writing that review right...about....>clickty<

Typo! You probably meant to write >clicky<! That invalidates your entire viewpoint and article! Fail!

Seriously, though. Great article. Thank you, Trevor.

I think the consensus characterisation of Windows 10 seems to be "nourishing soup, with occasional bits of turd floating in it, but less of them than Windows 8.x".

Just ONE THOUSAND times BETTER than FLASH! Intel, Micron's amazing claim

Re: Manufacturing capacity

Why do I get the feeling the biggest problem with this technology will be making enough of it?

Well, if there's one thing Intel are very good at, it's large-scale semiconductor manufacture. And once a fab plant's built, the #1 concern is to keep it busy.

So I don't have too many concerns in that area.

Re: It is about time

We have had fusion since the early 1950s (obviously).

Technically, we've had the benefits of fusion energy for a little longer than that.

I admit, I work in IT so can't vouch for this first-hand, but I'm told there's a large fusion reactor glowing yellow in the sky.

You know. Outside.

W3C's failed Do Not Track crusade tumbles to ad-blockers' Vietnam

Re: Mobile may yet save advertising. Briefly.

And for those of us on iThings, the iCab browser provides ad-blocking.

HP slaps dress code on R&D geeks: Bin that T-shirt, put on this tie

Re: lets start a new craze

You swine.

I was moderating a training webinar when I read your comment, on an open line with 40 other people. Unbidden, a paroxysm of laughter arose. The sheer effort required to suppress it means you owe me new sinuses.

And now I can't ever wear a tie again with a straight face.

I laugh in the face of fashion. Plain black t-shirt, non-scruffy black jeans,

Sounds like a guy I worked with until a couple of years ago. Even customers were directed to "look for the guy dressed like a roadie for Metallica".

One of the smartest guys I knew, and no-one (customers included) cared a fig for how he dressed.

Me? Jeans and Eddie Bauer shirts. I'm a conformist.

Re: Smart casual

Ah - good - I hate ironing jeans.

I don't iron my jeans, but then, I never drove a Vauxhall Tigra either.

#obscureoldTVadvertreference

Microsoft to Windows 10 consumers: You'll get updates LIKE IT or NOT

Re: Local Group Policy Editor

Except that traditionally, the local Group Policy Editor hasn't been available on Home versions of the OS.

There are usually Registry equivalents for each of its edits, though, and MS (used to) make available a handy spreadsheet that listed every policy and its registry location/values.

Feel like you're being herded onto Windows 10? Well, you should

Re: Life on the trailing edge...

I got a downvote? For a comment that amounted to "That's interesting. Care to provide more info?"

Somebody round here doesn't like me.

I didn't think anyone around here had met me yet.