Posts by upsidedowncreature

User complained his mouse wasn’t working. But he wasn’t using a mouse

Re: Confused Mouse

I've seen a user have trouble using the mouse because, instead of just moving it across the desk, they were "hovering" it a few mm above the surface.

HP ditches 15-minute wait time policy due to 'feedback'

Re: Irate customers

Extra AND redunant? Reported to the Department of Redundancy Department.

Early mornings, late evenings, weekends. Useless users always demand support

Re: Not just IT

As the HR manager, would you have to report their misconduct to yourself?

You're going to do what to the feature? Microsoft defines what it means by 'deprecation'

There's a joke about executing in there somewhere, damned if I can find it though.

I don't mind what they mean by it...

I just wish people would stop saying "depreciated" when they mean "deprecated".

Eutelsat OneWeb blames 366th day for 48-hour date disaster

Re: Excel bug

Is it fair to call it an Excel bug then? Isn't it a Lotus 1-2-3 bug that Excel replicated intentionally?

Critical hardcoded SolarWinds credential now exploited in the wild

Re: "A critical, hardcoded login credential"

Solarwinds123!

I think that's what it was last time, anyway.

Facebook prank sent techie straight to Excel hell

Re: Rather different

Famous Yorkshire people weren't they? I remember Phil Oakey of the Human League was one, although I don't know how familiar he'd be to a global audience.

Screwdrivers: is there anything they can't do badly? Maybe not

Re: Screwdrivers can be used for anything

I used to have a trailer on my drive, which I secured to a nearby magnolia tree using a chain and padlock, through a "V" in the trunk. I sold the trailer but the chain is now deeply embedded in the tree trunk, and it ain't ever coming out.

What's with AI boffins strapping GoPros to toddlers? We take a closer look

Re: Yeah that is bound to work

Proper names too - Cholmondley, Belvoir, Featherstonehaugh.

Council claims database pain forced it to drop apostrophes from street names

Re: Input validation

Yes, but the secret phrase/PIN/password, whatever you want to call it, is stored somewhere in plain text, even if it isn't displayed in full to the customer service agent on the phone. Are you seriously arguing that's good practice?

edit: Yes, I've come across this system often.

Re: Input validation

I'd be more worried that it sounds like they're storing your password in plain text if they can check specific characters.

Linux Foundation is leading fight against fauxpen source

Re: "tragic for open source innovation"

I think demon driver was being sarcastic.

X fixes URL blunder that could enable convincing social media phishing campaigns

Sounds like a clbuttic case of a bad search and replace.

Crowning glory of GOV.UK websites updated, sparking frontend upgrades

Re: FUCK the king twat

I didn't realise Harry was on here TBH.

Re: changes to things like police and military uniforms, and signage on official buildings

I'm just relieved both the Head of Design and the Senior Interaction Designer were involved, it would be awful if an important change like this were to be under-resourced.

Trident missile test a damp squib after rocket goes 'plop,' fails to ignite

Outside the environment?

Nearly 200 Boeing 737 MAX 9 airplanes grounded after door plug flies off mid-flight

It's not very typical, I'd like to make that point.

Windows keyboards to get a Copilot key – but how quickly will users jump?

Decades ago?

"The addition of the Windows key some three decades ago was the last time the company fiddled with keyboard hardware. "

Really? Didn't they add the fantastically useful emoji key in 2019?

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/emoji-key-featured-on-microsofts-latest-keyboards

Does Windows have a very weak password lurking in its crypto libraries?

How did you get that to display as "*****"?

It is 2023 and Excel's reign of date terror might finally be at an end

Re: Great. We're getting there

ISO 8601 FTW!

Airport chaos as eGates down for the count across UK

"The gates use facial recog technology"

ws t wrth sving a fw kystrkes fr tht?

Largest local government body in Europe goes under amid Oracle disaster

Professor Unwin? Is that you?

LG's $1,000 TV-in-a-briefcase is unlikely to travel much further than the garden

Re: Students?

We have the BBC which has no ads, it's instead funded by a licence (license? Never sure) that you have to buy if you have a TV. It's £159 a year so worth it I think, although there are those who think it should be abolished.

Lock-in to legacy code is a thing. Being locked in by legacy code is another thing entirely

Re: The other mechanism, of course, is the induction loop.

Sometimes flicking the side stand down is enough to trigger the loop. Remember to pull clutch in or go into neutral or you'll likely cut the engine!

Someone just blew over $190k on a 4GB first-gen iPhone

Re: What strikes us as odd...

It really hit home when Blue Monday turned 40 a few months ago.

Man who nearly killed physical media returns with $60,000 vinyl turntable

“ orthogonal layers of beech placed under extreme pressure to create an entirely new, solid and massive material”

Plywood, then.

Edit: I should have read the comments first, I see this observation has already been well made.

Techie wasn't being paid, until he taught HR a lesson

Re: Unique keys

I think I've mentioned it before, but in Mork and Mindy, Mindy's landlord was called Mr Wanker.

Pixies keep switching off my morning alarm, says Google Pixel owner

Re: Well that's weird

It’s been used (well, quieter acoustic versions have) in a couple of TV adverts in the UK in recent years.

edit: a package holiday company a few years ago and the current Apple Airpods ad.

If you fire someone, don't let them hang around a month to finish code

Re: Never risk it

I've been the person being called in to an unexpected meeting with HR - got the call on Sunday evening, the meeting was on Monday at 9:00. I dictated a list of systems and passwords that I insisted be changed, to protect myself. She said they had it all covered, but they had missed several.

Visual Basic 6 returns: You've been a good developer all year. You have social distanced, you have helped your mom. Here's your reward

Re: I liked VB5/VB6

Correct, but there were no curly braces - it was all End If, End Loop etc. In mixed case. Dear God.

Also indentation was completely optional so many didn't bother with it, making untangling nested control structures an unalloyed joy.

UK firm NOW: Pensions tells some customers a 'service partner' leaked their data all over 'public software forum'

What forum was the data uploaded to, and how did the upload come to light? The file must have been pretty big - about 1.6GB if it had 1024 bytes per record (please check maths!)- so it wasn't uploaded by accident. Was it malicious in intent? The company seem to be implying that it wasn't. If it wasn't, what goes through the mind of somebody uploading a file that size, containing lots of PII, to a forum? Fresh air, probably.

Unsecured Azure blob exposed 500,000+ highly confidential docs from UK firm's CRM customers

Re: No more Mr Nice Guy

I upvoted you, but why is putting company directors inside not do-able? It seems like fines aren't having the required effect. The threat of doing some bird would focus the mind and shift priorities.

HP bows to pressure, reinstates free monthly ink plan... for existing customers

Re: Not eager to get a HP printer

You'll never guess who bought Samsung's printer division a whle back...

edit: Wow, in 2017, I hadn't realised it was that long ago.

We're not saying this is how SolarWinds was backdoored, but its FTP password 'leaked on GitHub in plaintext'

It's OK...

They've secured it now, they've changed it to "SolarWinds123!"

AFAICT this is the whole problem that code signing was designed to solve, I would love to know the precise details of how the attackers managed to sign the code.

India to spend up big on submarine cable to sparsely-populated but strategically-placed remote island group

Spend up big

Spend up big? What fresh hell is this? It’s bigly uncromulent.

For every disastrous rebrand, there is an IT person trying to steer away from the precipice

Nanu Nanu

Mindy's landlord in Mork and Mindy was called Mr Wanker.

Crooks social-engineer GoDaddy staff into handing over control of crypto-biz domain names

Re: Why can't they ever give clear information.

Because these communications are produced by communications professionals whose purpose is to convey as little information as possible while making sympathetic noises.

Sophisticated...

They're always sophisticated, these attacks. They're never the result of clicking a dodgy link, or inadvertently letting slip that you use your dog's name as a password. Damn sophisticated, these hackers.

Not exactly the kind of housekeeping you want when it means the hotel's server uptime is scrubbed clean

Re: Simply Ghastly...

No good if the UPS isn't in use - it wasn't in the article. An intriguing device though!

Amazon drops battery-powered Echo speaker so you can play Despacito on the go

Boomer indeed, I'll have you know I'm Gen-X and proud of it. And consequently knackered.

I thought the word "drops" in the headline meant they were stopping production, not introducing a new model.

That's what makes you hackable: Please, baby. Stop using 'onedirection' as a password

Re: Uncomplicated

Eh? How is enpass.io not an online password application? Also, why are you undermining yourself by storing text copies of passwords?

Re: 1-2-3-4-5?

That's odd, all I see is * * * * *.

Apple: EU can't make us use your stinking common charging standard

It's acceptable if you use an oxygen-free directional USB cable, as long as you spend a few days conditioning the cable first.

"Apple argued any move compelling it to ditch the Lightning port, which has been a staple of the iPhone for almost a decade, would inconvenience its customers, simultaneously creating an "unprecedented volume" of electronic waste."

Funny how those considerations weren't important when they ditched the 30-pin connector for lightning.

Microsoft boffin inadvertently highlights .NET image woes by running C# on Windows 3.11

Re: BTW if you need a cross-platform GUI development solution

Good point. Even applications from Microsoft don't all follow the same rules.

Not just adhesive, but alcohol-resistant adhesive: Well done, Apple. Airpods Pro repairability is a zero

Re: Simply Ghastly...

You've given this *far* too much thought.

The D in Systemd is for Directories: Poettering says his creation will phone /home in future

*raises hand*

$30/month email upstart Superhuman brought low with a blast of privacy Kryptonite

cf Whatsapp

I can understand the privacy concern, but how is this different to Whatsapp, which indicates when a message has been read?