Posts by Zolko

Coding in a war zone: A Ruby developer's life in Kharkiv

The unity that Ukrainians show from the very first days

this doesn't seem to concern the 12 000 Ukrainian deaths in the Donbass by Ukrainian bombs during the past 8 years though.

I'll give a dissenting voice here: Ukraine has forbidden local languages in their country, including Hungarian which is the native mother-tongue of several hundred-thousand Ukrainians. This doesn't justify the current deaths in Ukraine, but shines a dubious lights on the Ukrainian nationalist mentality. And this interview doesn't really help to dispel that uncomfortable feeling.

Maybe I am being selfish here ...

yes, you are: there is a war raging in Yemen with much more deaths than in Ukraine, did you give your support to those people ? Make peace with your neighbor and stop complaining that the entire world should rush to your rescue. Nobody came to Hungary's rescue in 1956 either.

Afraid of the big bad Linux desktop? Zorin 16.1 is here

Re: Android Apps

It's based on the Ubuntu toy

and Gnome. I'll stay with MX-Linux, based on Debian, without systemd, and KDE

Russia labels Meta an 'extremist' organization, bans Instagram

Re: I pity the Russian people

they've had 30 years of western goods and technology

you might want to verify that: I bet that the piece of technology you're using to write that is actually Chinese. There is an easy check: turn the device over, and if it's written "Made in P.R.C " then the Russian know where to get it by leaving out a level of middlemen.

There is a story about a horse, a wolf and a human, involving a saddle that the human puts on the horse to hunt down the wolf. Didn't turn out well for the horse.

The Human Genome Project will tell us who to support at Eurovision

Gotta love the tale of the DNA swabs and the factory worker

this is the same story as the photomaton repair man in the film "Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain ". Apparently based on a true story by Michel Folco.

Where is the romantic rainbow-colored unicorn logo ?

US warns Chinese chipmakers: Sell to Russia, suffer Huawei's fate

tit for tat

I'm wondering whether some Chinese authorities are thinking: "Try that, and Taïwan will suffer Ukraine's fate ". It's not as if we hadn't been warned about such possibilities, all they need is an excuse.

PayPal, Visa, Mastercard suspend Russian services

Re: Huge long food queues in Russia

Russian’s love queuing, it’s in their DNA.

isn't this fundamentally racist ? Or is it now accepted to be racist if it's against the villain-du-jour ? Before that, the villain-du-jour was Al Quaida and Bin Laden (Arabs/Muslims), and the next ones will be the Chinese. I'm sadly surprised how easily many people are brainwashed into such Pavlovian bite-reflex, and how easily this blatant hatred is accepted – even welcome – by educated people like those from ElReg.

post-covid

So, if I understand correctly, after 2 years of wrecking the world economy and taking on thousands of billions of debt for an illness that is barely more dangerous than the regular flu, the "western" governments think that it's wise to cut-off from the world economy – already facing shortages on many products – the provider of the worlds 10-30% of raw material ? And that supposedly for a country absolutely nobody cared for in the past 7 years ? The only logical thinking I can come up with is that either these governments are complete idiots, or there is a hidden plan.

Said hidden plan being actually not so hidden and called" The Great Reset". Exactly how they want to achieve that by wrecking the western economies is not quite clear. I hope their plan is well worked out, because I quite trust the Russians and the Chinese that they did some long-term planning ahead. Unfortunately, I don't have the same level of confidence in the planning-ahead when thinking about Boris, Ursula, Joe or Emanuel.

BBC points Russians to the Tor version of itself

Fahrenheit 451

RT.com is unreachable, even through TOR.

451 fahrenheit (232,8°C) is the temperature at which paper burns. It's also the name of a science-fiction book by Ray Bradbury that depicts a totalitarian regime that forbids some books and burns them so that people cannot read them, and thus be "perverted" by them. It takes its subject from the McCarthism that was prevalent in the 1950-ies in the USA.

Since Internet is what books and newspaper used to be, the censoring of Russian sites proves that our "western liberal" societies have reached that totalitarian regime. I mean, for those who didn't hear the shot since 2 years of Covidian nonsense. Now we can see that it was not nonsense, it was a dictatorial takeover : all the tools that were put in place to "save lives" will now be used to censor and control the population.

Icon, obviously

Ukraine asks ICANN to delete all Russian domains

Re: It's not quite as simple as "Cutting Russia Off"

the EU bimbo van der Leyen won't notice the terrible inflation that Europe will experience as a result from this sanction hysteria

I very much think that she actually *wanted* that inflation to happen, because that eases the huge mountain of debt that the financial ponzi-scheme had built up. I think that it will fly in their face, because hyperinflation cannot be controlled, but I *do* think that she'll notice.

Re: "your authoritarian government is committing human rights abuses"

Refugees are refugees

not quite: in Ukraine, only women and children are fleeing, men are staying to fight. In the African boats, only men are fleeing, leaving women and children in poverty behind

Re: proportionality

I think you'll find that the Ukrainians had no intention of invading or bombing Russia.

Logic doesn't seem to be your strength: did Libya, Syria or Irak have intentions - or even the possibility - to invade the US or UK ?

Re: NATO expansion

pushed the Eastern countries into NATO. They saw it as their only hope for survival

As far as Hungary is concerned, this is wrong. Many well-written articles say that the NATO provoked the current situation, and what we are witnessing in reality is the end of the US world domination. The beginning of that end is the US/UK lead 2003 war on Irak, followed by the collapse of the western financial world in 2008. The "west" thought that the temporal weakness of Russia during the drunken Eltsin times were the real face of Russia, and they got that-one wrong.

All else is poetry.

Example if you can read Hungarian : https://index.hu/velemeny/2022/02/26/puzser-robert-publicisztika-orosz-ukran-haboru/

Re: Well, ya know….

I don't see the US engaging in a land war with its neighbours

Why is a land war with a country - many countries actually - that is (are) far away more acceptable ? Invading your neighbor is bad, bad invading the neighbor(s) of your neighbor(s) is OK : what sort of logic is that ?

Re: Block the internet?

How does Russia get its internet connectivity and why does it still have it?

you're reading ElReg and you ask such a question ? Even I can set-up a "local" Internet and then have a gateway to the "outer" Internet and the NSA would be able to do anything about it, so imagine the Russian hackers !

Re: DNS root servers

any requests for a .ru domain would be directed to x.x.x.x

you mean that to circumvent this DNS blockade, all that the Russians would have to do is to use generic .com domains ? Gee, they'll *never* think of that. And I'm also sure they've never heard about VPNs to some friendly neighboring countries.

I hope for the Ukrainians that they have cleverer people in their country than those asking for such trivialities, or I wouldn't bet much on their future.

New flashpoint: US may ask Chinese tech firms to bin Russia

Re: You're Next

This war is really about global hegemony

actually, I think that this war is about the world post peak-oil. And Russians have plenty of that, everyone will want some of it. Most people seem to think in short time-span, the war is not even 1 week old.

Also, Russia and Ukraine export 30% of all wheat in the world market ... imagine what will happen when 2 billion people (Africa + Middle-East) begin to be hungry in a couple of months ? Where do you think will all these hungry and angry people try to go ? And who do you think the Russians will sell that food to : countries that participate in the sanctions, probably not so much.

I'm quite sure Putin and the Russians have made their homework on these questions. Unfortunately, I'm not sure that the "western leaders" did theirs.

US imposes sanctions as Russia invades Ukraine

Re: @martinusher - Sanctions and Resources

Just because Putin isn't calling it a war doesn't mean it isn't a war !

does that apply to the war that Saudi Arabia is waging in Yemen against the rebel terrorists ? Or Israel regularly bombing its neighbors ?

Face-it : it all began with the US-UK invasion/destruction of Iraq in 2003, by abusing the UN in front of the entire world. And the world didn't forget. Frankly, the crocodile tears are ridiculous.

Ré : Crimea's water supply

See Bloomberg :

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-03-19/russia-vs-ukraine-crimea-s-water-crisis-is-an-impossible-problem-for-putin

Crimea’s Water Crisis Is an Impossible Problem for Putin

The Russian-occupied peninsula is thirsty, with reservoirs running low

The problem is apparently not "impossible ", it's the real reason for the attack. What did the Ukranians expect ?

Re: @martinusher - Sanctions and Resources

so far I haven't heard a single opinion on what would Russia do after the invasion.

it's for the water to Crimea: Ukraine cut off the water supply, and they need it back. All Russia wants is access to that large river and turn on the water supply to Crimea again.

This won't be any bloody war, at least not from Russian side.

Now, the USA, of course, will use this provoked war to do some other mischief, and it's that part that you should be worried about.

Cyberwarfare looms as Russia shells, invades Ukraine

Re: SWIFT see SPFS

Russians and Ukrainians united together against Putin

Russians and Ukrainians don't have the short memory time-span of a gold-fish: they remember very well that Biden is personally responsible for the Maidan coup-d'état in 2013, that his son was paid millions on Ukrainian money, that he openly bragged about interfering into the Ukrainian judicial system to remove a prosecutor who investigated about corruption into that very company where his very son was paid millions for nothing. They probably also remember very well Victoria "Fuck the EU " Nuland who is now in Biden's foreign affairs ...

Airtag clones can sidestep Apple anti-stalker tech

Re: "we condemn in the strongest possible terms any malicious use of our products."

Why is it Apple's fault that people are dicks?

you seriously ask why it is Apple's fault if it lets iStuff connect to iPhones without the user's consent or knowledge ? Because that's what these iStuff do: connect via bluetooth to nearby unsuspecting iPhones, and through them connect via the iPhone's internet connection to Apple headquarters.

China's top chipmaker pivots to domestic sales, struggles to satisfy demand

Re: Is it me?

May-be we're getting more news about China because they actually do more ? The times when China was a cheap labor manufacturer are loooong gone: now they build bases on the Moon. When was the last time that UK – or any European country – did send something to the Moon surface ?

Red Hat signals Intel's software-defined silicon will debut in Linux 5.18

Re: Smells like a Xeon CPU with an attached FPGA

That at least would make sense. But I think that this is not new, it's exactly what Xilinx does with ARM cpus.

Re: He has already begun accepting them.

If this is true, then we have reached peak-Linus. Time for a fork

Apple emits emergency fix for exploited-in-the-wild WebKit vulnerability

Re: Hmm...

Google forked part of Webkit to build Blink

and not ONE mention that it all started with Apple forking KDE's khtml renderer for Konquerror to make Safari ?

Apple tweaks AirTags to be less useful for stalkers, thieves

Re: Fun ways to kill one.

I guess you're that same Anonymous Coward that is posting all over this thread to try damage-control on this criminal activity. Apple employee ? El Reg, can you check his (or hers) IP address, out of curiosity ?

"Criminal" device? WTF?

Apparently, these AirThings connect with bluetooth to all Apple devices in reach, and contact Apple through them. Even through Apple devices owned by other people, without knowledge, end even less consent, of the other device's owner. This is called hacking into other peoples computers, and yes, it's criminal: if, for example, you connected on a train into someone else's computer, and then through there, you connect to the Internet, this would be forbidden. But if you sold devices that do just that, by millions, you're operating a criminal network on internatiol scale.

Imagine someone was assaulted, or even killed, after being tracked by such a device. We're talking life-time prison here, so you should be very careful what you say anonymously.

Apple AirTags contact all iPhones and Macs in range

wait wait wait .... WHAT ? If I have a Mac or iPhone, I'm automatically part of that scam network ? Apple can use my computer or phone for their use at their convenience ?

Re: I'm still trying to understand how Apple failed even to consider this use case

Bluetooth proximity tags of various brands have been on the market for years, but those were OK then for you?

How could someone follow me at distance with a bluetooth proximity tag that has only some 10m reach ?

The more I read about these the more criminal they seem: do they use bluetooth to broadcast through nearby iPhones, whose owner doesn't even know that his phone is (ab)used in such a way ? Is that how these AirTags operate, by hijacking unsuspecting iPhones users ?

Re: What the hell ?

You mean that all iPhones know all the iPhones in the vicinity ? How do they do that ?

Re: I'm still trying to understand how Apple failed even to consider this use case

It's main purpose is solely (for them) to pull people into the Apple eco-system

hold-on: you mean that the purpose of this thing is to force people to buy Apple stuff by endangering their life if they don't use Apple stuff ? This is criminal.

Not that I expect being the target of a stalker, but how would I know ? Seriously : how can I be sure ? And don't mention the Android AirTag app, I might not be using an Android phone. Genuine question.

Re: I'm still trying to understand how Apple failed even to consider this use case

I'm more surprised/worried that legal authorities have allowed this device on the market: after-all, if it's emitting electromagnetic waves, they must have gone through some certification process. These things should be forbidden.

Re: Fun ways to kill one.

@ShadowSystems : you forgot step 1: "Find-it "

actually, you also forgot step 0: "Discover that there is something to be found without investing in Apple stuff, the very manufacturer of this criminal device ".

World's top chipmaking equipment maker claims Chinese rival may infringe IP

chicken come home ?

What did anyone expect : harming and sanctioning Chinese electronics companies (Huawei ...) for made-up reasons, yet still manufacturing all electronics products there, and expecting them not to try to react to it ? Either politicians are stupid, or they have a very clever and hidden agenda.

Same question for Russia also, actually (sanctions and still buying gas and petrol from them at rising prices).

To our total surprise, Apple makes adding alternative payment systems to apps 'painful, expensive, clunky'

Re: This is one of the reasons

Because back some time, MacBook Pro's were excellent Linux machines. Around the latest retina models that had HDMI and USB ports. After that, they became unusable.

Russia's naval exercise near Ireland unlikely to involve cable-tapping shenanigans

Re: re. the EU wouldn't be able to agree on how or even whether to use it

But what if they do end up conquering and occupying the Baltic States and Ukraine?

well, what about it ? Why would I – or you – care ? The Russians did already conquer part of Ukraine (Crimea) and the world didn't go under. Actually, nothing happened, and I'm pretty sure the Crimeans are quite happy that Russia did annex them.

But there is more to that: Russia had a good reason (good for them) to annex Crimea, what good reason would they have to invade Estonia ? If Putin has proven anything in the past 20 years, it's that he is not the madman that some western news-outlets try to paint.

Breath of fresh air: v7.3 of LibreOffice boasts improved file importing and rendering

I will skip this one too

I tried 7.2 and it was very bad in many ways, came back to 7.1, which is quite good (= reliable). Will update to 7.1.8 though

Google dumps interest-based ad system for another interest-based ad system

Me too ... but I suspect that 99% of humanity doesn't understand what's happening. And even those who do don't know what to do about it, and/or don't care. Or even welcome such crap.

Machine needs more Learning: Google Drive dings single-character files for copyright infringement

I used to merely hate Google, now I totally loathe them

you should try to ignore them

I went back in time and patented time-travel itself, so no luck for you

Re: binary joke

there are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't.

IBM confirms new mainframe to arrive 'late in first half of 2022'

Re: Converted COBOL to Java on IBM M/F

Nice, but you forgot to place "hybrid "

Foxstuck: Firefox browser bug boots legions of users offline

Re: "Waterfox users were totally unaffected. ®"

but then I'm using Windows 3.11 For Workgroups, DOS 6.0, and Netscape Navigator

Huh, bleading-edge, I'm using NCSA Mosaic on HPUX with the CDE desktop.

Version 7 of WINE is better than ever at running Windows apps where they shouldn't

It ceased being a useful operating system with version 8+

Windows 7 was probably the best OS they made.

Meta Platforms demands staffers provide proof of COVID-19 booster vaccine before returning to office

Re: Good.

its just that CoViD is the current topic

do you mean to say that next year there will be some new hot topic and "they " will want to impose some other new "vaccine " to experiment with ? I don't know what is worse: the criminals doing this, or the sheep willingly accepting it.

Re: Good.

The oft-stated but never cited 99% figure is a lie

no, it's a verifiable data: look at the data from the cruise ship Diamond Princess (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_on_Diamond_Princess).

- 3711 people on board (2,666 passengers and 1,045 crew)

- The median age of the crew was 36 while the median age of the passengers was 69 (!)

- quarantined 1st of february

- 696 tested positive by 1st march (1 month later)

- 7 dead by 1st march = 1% (all of them aged >70y)

- survival of 99% for those catching the Covid19, and 99.8% if considering the entire boat population

Which means that by march 2020, any person interested in the subject could know that the Covid-19 is only dangerous for (very) old people. THIS is documented and verifiable science.

Linux Mint 20.3 appears – now with more Mozilla flavor: Why this distro switched Firefox defaults back to Google

Re: And this is why

First thing I'd want to decide is probably whether to go with the .deb (Debian, Ubuntu, Mint...) or .rpm packaging based distro family (Red Hat, Fedora, ...)

that's easy: the DEB package hasn't changed for 20 years, which shows how good the initial design was, while RPM has changed many times and leads easily to the dreaded rpm-hell, where you can screw up dependencies in a BIG way: no such thing EVER with DEB packages.

Re: I shall be investigating

the author's observation "...the most usable, versatile, and feature-complete all-round Linux desktop experience..."

I beg to differ: I prefer MX-Linux. It's Debian-based, which makes away with 1 intermediary (Ubuntu), it's SystemD-free, and defaults to KDE. It also has a really good driver detection and setup for proprietary drives (Nvidia with NVIDIA_PRIME !, WiFi...).

NixOS and the changing face of Linux operating systems

Re: A more easily understandabe file tree? Yes, please!

I don't much mind if the core of the OS is in its own directory or even one or more hidden directories, but stuff that I can install via the package manager

I agree that there is a bad confusion in the Linux world: the core system – as in an OS = Operating System – and the user's applications should have different treatment. In an ideal world, the OS should be quite minimaliste to be able to ... well, operate the system: kernel, init system, minimal set of commands? May-be add a graphical layer if it is considered a core system. BUT: leave out all the user applications !!!

And I think that is exactly what the /usr was meant to be: but then came /opt, and /usr/local, and then the braindead RedHat decided that /usr should be merged down to / , and the idiots from Debian follow like they did with SystemD.

So PLEASE: come back to the old Unix way of doing things and everything will be fine: put all the core system at the / (root) and all application stuff in a separet directory. And since /usr is already there, just use it !!!

Re: rm -rf /*

someone will still find a way to do it, due to ...

... remote login that terminated without being noticed. Like: you were logged in a remote embedded system that you were setting up, it failed, and you want to start over again. You want to erase everything from the root ... but in the mean time, a colleague called for coffee break, and when you come back, the session has been terminated and the dreaded command is executed locally, not on the remote system.

Has happened, not on the root filesystem but on the users $HOME.

US trade watchdog opposes Nvidia's Arm buy, mostly over fears about datacentre innovation

There is plenty of competition in the CPU space ...

... thanks to ARM essentially. Apart from ARM, all other competition – SPARC, MIPS, PowerPC, Transmeta (remember them ?), Via – disappeared. Risc-V is not yet a contender.