Posts by Doctor Syntax

Ex-NSA bad-guy hunter listened to Scattered Spider's fake help-desk calls: 'Those guys are good'

"Don't you know who I am?"

"Not until you prove it."

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

Re: TODO

"I think a helpful resource could be Louis Rossmann's guide to an open source life."

It's somewhat ironic geiven what he sayas a paragraph or two later that when the guy encourages readers to email him Cloudlare, ever helpful, renders it as "please email [email protected] FOR HELP".

OK. Here are my overall reflections on the matter.

1. It's everyone's right, if they wish, to donate money to and be disrespected by multiple large US corporations. For others -

2. Moving from a Windows base to a Linux one is a platform migration an needs to be planned just as much as a move to a larger server, a move to or retreat from the Cloud somebody else's computer in the bigger IT world. That applies whether it's a home user or a fleet of PCs in a business.

3. The eventual route would depend on what's being used on the computer(s) concerned. The first thing is to evaluate that.

4. If everything's being done via MS <365 or Google work space or whatever and the only thing running locally is a browser with no data held locally then just install something really minimal and a browser. Bonus points if you can remove and reuse the existing storage and boot the whole thing off the smallest SD card you can find.

5. Where what the user habitually uses has cross-platform equivalents install those, encourage the user to use them. It may take some learning and some investigation to do things in different ways. If that's successful then (a) you know that it will work when the migration's completed and (b) the migration's already under way.

6. Where there appear to be equivalents that are not cross platform set up a live distro to test them out as above.

7. Agreed with a lot of the commentators - we need a single distro and that distro needs to be as less unfamiliar looking as possible so I'm suggesting a cut-down Debian or Devuan (my preference is for the latter) installing KDE and - because we can - cosmetics which will make the overall appearance as familiar as possible to a refugee from Windows. They can change it later.

8. This is a bit heretical. I've said numerous times that I don't like sudo, it's a security risk having only the one password for unprivileged and privileged access. OTOH if we're dealing with users who can barely cope with one password and the Debian menus are set up for su rather than sudo access we have to make a concession: suggest to the user that if they want they can use the same password for their ordinary log on or for administration purposes (we'll try to avoid calling it "root") they can but they are strongly advised to use different passwords but it's very important that they remember the administrative one.

9. We'll start off by installing the Linux distro dual boot if only so that we can set up a link to the user's data on Windows.

10. More heresy. If there is Windows software which can't be replaced don't bother with Wine. Virtualise the existing Windows installation and run the application in VirtualBox's Seamless mode or whatever equivalent is provided by whatever virtualisation platform is used. If it's possible to use some of the tricks in Liam's previous articles to shrink the Windows installation or set up one of the minified versions as install the software on that, so much the better.

11. An "app store" is needed. That would be Discover but it needs to be fixed first. This is the KDE application management application. It's reputed to work for some but personally I've never seen it not complain that it can't find network connectivity and from queries online I'm not alone. It will report installed software. It will apply updates that have been downloaded but it will not be able to search for additional packages.

Re: Decision tree?

"I would ask how easy it is to install another disk."

Experimenting with a live ISO might be a better way although, at least in the case of experimenting with LibreOffice, Thunderbird etc. it would be easier to just install them under Windows.

Re: Decision tree?

Most users select "I have no idea" because they've never tested anything in LibreOffice.

Given that LibreOffice is cross platform then the site could advise them how to install it on Windows so that they can test it. The same applies to other cross platform applications.

"Linux does not have the consistency of user interface and applications"

On second thoughts I'll go along with this to some extent. Not that that excuses Windows changes of UI from version to version. Nor does Microsoft's behaviour excuse this bit:

GTK. Once upon a time GTK applications would follow the user's desktop icon theme on toolbars. Icons were one of the shared resources. A distro might default to a particular icon set but an individual user could choose their own. QT based applications still do this. Then GTK built an icon set into a library. I suppose this was a move towards consistency as they understood it but what it means is that they stopped playing nicely with applications not using GTK.

To have consistency now the desktop theme needs to be set to their own icon set and stuff user choice. It doesn't help that their icon set looks like something a young child would have drawn although my granddaughter would have been ashamed to have been that child since the age of about 5.

Then along came GTK 4...

Other aspects such as scroll-bars have also been affected by this.

Kudos to LibreOffice who, in the interests of being a good cross-platform application, designed the UI as a separate layer. Although it doesn't use the desktop's shared icons but it allows for icon sets to be loaded as add-ons.

The current situation on my dsktop, therefore, is:

KDE applications have a UI consistent with what I've been using for years. Any other application built with QT will follow that.

GTK2 applications likewise.

LibreOffice looks as if it belongs as my chosen icon theme is available

Odds and ends I've written with Lazarus are also consistent.

GTK3 applications are consistent between themselves but inconsistent with the desktop's theme and, to my eyes, ugly.

GTK4 applications are currently broken - it might be fairly new but somewhere along the line they have already suffered bit-rot during the life of the current Debian although, at least for the time being they're restored to their even greater ugliness on Trixie which will become the current Debian next month.

Re: What have you got?

Legacy equipment tends to outlast the official life of the OS of the PC it was supplied which is a problem in itself. If you've got 40 year old kit that works with 11 it must be pretty undemanding. It goes back to the MS-DOS era.

From the Windows users' complaints here I gather that Microsoft keeps changing what she has to use to send mail so the easy option there would be suggest she make one more change to Thunderbird and then enjoy the stability.

Re: Linux alternatives

Of course it's not free. 11's included in the price of your hardware. Now you've got used to subscriptions 12 will very likely cost you $$ a month.

We can probably agree on LO Base. But:

"and yet, the UX still sucks as well The sad thing is that there actually are modern office applications for Linux, such as OnlyOffice or Softmaker Office, yet it's LibreOffice which gets recommended for Linux newbies."

However, neither OnlyOffice or Softmaker Office have database applications so it can't be that that makes you thing of them as "modern office applications" in a way that you think LibreOffice isn't. What could it be.

Could it be the ribbon UI? I always saw that as Microsoft's delaying tactic. They'd had their arm twisted to standardise thair file format (after a fashion) which not only deprived them of contagious planned obsolescence to drive sales but also meant they could no longer provide a moving target for LibreOffice. So they forced a new UI on their user base "because we can" hoping it would take time for LibreOffice to catch up. Or maybe I'm wrong and it was just to present something new to fashion victims.

In any event, if that's your criterion you're probably too unfamiliar with LibreOffice to be aware that it's well past being "experimental" and your "modern office" UI - or UX if you prefer - is 4 clicks away. I suppose they could have made it the default but they respect their existing user base rather more than Microsoft did.

Re: TODO

"Person 2: There's probably some Linux equivalent."

Let's extend that:

Person 2: There's probably some Linux equivalent. Your start menu has xxxx which is the application that installs applications from the distro's repository your app store and you can install it from there.

Person 1: There's not. / What if there isn't?

Person 2: Use Wine. You can install it from xxxx and then use that to install your Windows application.

Absolutely no need for them to reach for Google and be directed to an CLI installer. Because any distro you'd advise them to install has its GUI interface to the repository which they should be encouraged to use and has Wine in that repository.

And, yes, I'm more likely to install something via Synaptic myself because I can search for it instead of having to remember the exact package name.

Probably we're misunderstanding each other but broadly in agreement. Your comment "Not being precious about our favourite flavour of command line distro would be a good start." seems to suggest we'd encourage new users to install CLI-only distros.

Also, you seemed to be saying you'd like to introduce the users to Linux but are stuck with Windows PCs. In that case installing Linux alongside Windows might cause less friction with your charity - and and dual Linux/Windows installation I've seen puts Linux at the top of the list and boots it by default so in that case it could become seen as normal and Windows as that oddity at the bottom of the list.

I'm now starting to wonder whether it might not be better to recommend Debian or Devuan from the start. I'm coming round to the view that the usual suggestions, Ubuntu, Mint & Zorin are all suffering from not invented here syndrome and seeking to differentiate themselves by throwing in odd gimmicks. Maybe a simpler installer that omits Tasksel and installs a pre-determined desktop (preferably KDE as it would be closer to what users might have experienced with Windows).

Re: Is this all Yorkshiremen?

Both my CiL and self are both Yorkshire folk as it happens. The reason she's on Zorin is because years ago when she was using Windows it got hit by ransomware. Fortunately rather crude ransomware so the unencrypted files were recoverable - using a Linux-based live ISO of course. Switching to Linux prevented a recurrence of that.

"The more that we can show that we use 'Nux in the same way the more chance there is that this will change. Not being precious about our favourite flavour of command line distro would be a good start."

Then why not set up those PCs to dual boot? And why would you consider a command line distro as al alternative?

Re: Pinta is great

As another KDE user - KolorPaint is very basic.

When I say Pinta sometimes has problems adding straight line segments on a large map I'm adding them as an overlay on maybe the third of fourth layer at 50% opacity so the base map shows through and will be saving the result as a .ora. KolorPaint is not the tool for that job. I would very much like to see it updated so that it could be. Krita is also not the tool for the job - it's aimed at digital art creation for which Pinta would not be appropriate.

But, hey, this is Linux so we can stock up on multiple graphics tools.

Why, if you're using KDE, would you need to faff with fstab for an SMB share? Just use Dolphin* to set it up.

For non-KDE users this is the file manager and, although it will come as a surprise to some of the Windows boosters it's a fully graphical file manager, no CLI required. I'm told the Windows equivalent eventually caught up with it by acquiring tabs.

Re: TODO

"You write software and are an electronics engineer."

You do realise that the readership of this site is strongly skewed in that direction, don't you?

Those of us of our generation were not developing and administering computers in a vacuum. We did so to support many users who ere using those computers as part of their work, generally on dumb TTYs and subsequently adapted to text-based PCs and generations of GUI. Those who are still with us will have had a rather wider experience than a younger generation. Don't diss that experience of adapting.

Re: TODO

"they will count CLI commands as programming"

For the average user this is no more necessary in Linux than in Windows.

As I write SWMBO is using her laptop for something. If you asked her what she's actually using she'd probably tell you "Google". The fact that to access Google, - or the video she's found with it - she's using Seamonkey on Devuan Linux is not particularly significant to her. From a user's PoV it just works in the same way that the same sites would work on some web browser on Windows or Mac.

"GIMP and DarkTable are not really intuitive, unless you have worked a lot with digital photo editing before."

I don't expect I'd find Photoshop intuitive, being more used to GIMP.

Re: TODO

How many teenagers are that knowledgeable these days? Some of them will know nothing but Mac, most will have been brainwashed with Windows or possibly Chromebooks at school. It's a good strategy for help choosing a smartphone.

How sticky notes saved 'the single biggest digital program in the world'

"This is posting stuff on a board for everyone to see."

If it's everybody's job it's nobody's job.

Is the person who thinks "I can do that" going to add "and I'll do it now instead of this much higher priority job"?

Perhaps somebody should have added a post-in note saying "Take charge of assigning tasks by priority and skill set". Once that was settled they would have been the person to email.

Re: Yes but

You have an excellent point but short-sightedness is not the same as malignity.

Re: "assumptions don't turn out to be what humans look like when you hit them"

Things have not changed for the last 60 or so years. Those were the days when you had to "sign on" once a week to prove you were making yourself available for work. When the erk behind the counter told me I wasn't available for work because I hadn't been in to sign on I asked him to explain how going to a job interview at the other end of the country on signing-on day wasn't being available for work. I formed the opinion that some of the staff were on the wrong side of the counter.

Re: Universal Basic Income

"So many empty office towers that used to be full of paper pushers who spent their lives deciding eligibility for myriad inadequate benefits."

Convert them to housing for those who want to live in cities.

"One of the many benefits is the end of children going without."

That depends on how the UBI is spent.

Re: Yes but

It's rather like income tax: designed by salaried civil servants who know of no other circumstances.

Re: Billions? Years? Your Taxpayer Pound Sterling At Work!!

"Sir Iain Duncan Smith?? Or a citizen receiving Universal Credit??"

s/Or/And/

"you don't wait and email somebody"

Of course not. You just email somebody without waiting. The message is going to get through a lot faster than waiting for the recipient to notice a note on the board.

Dilettante dev wrote rubbish, left no logs, and had no idea why his app wasn't working

Re: The Worst...

For some politicians that's what pi is.

Re: The code was well structured but ...

/* Nope, you can't do it that way because [explanation] */

I'm reminded of the saying that beginner programmers write comments that say what the code does, journeymen programmers write comments that say why it's doing it that way, great programmers write comments that say why it shouldn't be done some other way.

So congratulations.

Re: Divers log

The divider for real money was a double dot £1··5d is equivocally 245d. We were also encouraged to use a dash as a separator for funny money so that £1-5p is unequivocally 105p although £1-05p would be preferred.

Re: Divers log

"And pints are funny, and maybe ounces are funny,"

Sigh.

Pints from gallons and ounces from pounds are, respectively, 8 and 16.

Is there anything about numbers that you recognise in an IT related context?

If you then think of the practicality of dividing the gallon or the pound with the simplest of weighing equipment do you recognise why such schemes were used? And the further subdivisions into halves and quarters when smaller amounts were needed?

Binary schemes always were - and still are - good practical schemes. Decimal schemes are good for people who count on their fingers.

Re: Divers log

Give your children the task of working out how, with a simple balance, to produce an ounce of sugar (for example) given a pound to start with. Then how to get a hundred grams starting with a kilo.

Re: Divers log

Well, obviously. Tou couldn't use "twenty four blackbirds" in the rhyme; doesn't scan.

Re: Divers log

"The Groat (4 pence) shows just how much value a penny had several hundred years ago."

It was also quite common to use pence for values greater than a shilling - it would be common to use 18d rather then 1'6d or 30s rather than £1..10s. In medieval and later documents it's not unusual to see sums given as hundreds of shillings. Then there was the mark, 2/3 of a pound.

Re: Divers log

I thought we should have gone binary - 256p to the pound. Far closer to the old value of 240d and giving much less scope for that sort of thing. And, of course far more modern than decimal.

Re: Divers log

there would be a *lot* of people alive today who had to make this very switch, and probably still have a strong bias for the whole/parts (1.5 -> 1lb 5oz).

We carry all sorts of fractions of in our heads too. For instance, 13s 4d is 2/3.

As to pounds and ounces it's as well to remember that this was a handy binary subdivision (and for good practical reasons), none of your legacy decimal stuff. I always reckoned that the new penny should have been 1/256 of a pound - slightly less than an old penny.

Re: Divers log

We would write £1 2s 6d, 5' 8", 2lb 4oz.

Also 10/6 or 10'6 would be ten shillings and six pence.

Google backs down after locking out Nextcloud Files app

Re: They will wait a few months

"until there is a credible alternative app store"

There is: F-Droid

Microsoft winnows: Layoffs hit software engineers hard

Re: Start the clock!

"a detailed transformational plan and not merely an infographic"

What do you mean? Surely for highly paid business executives the infographic is the plan.

Trump says he has a problem if Apple builds iThings in India

They can build for the US in the US and somewhere else for the rest of the world.

I wonder what the response would be if Apple took out full page adds to say that they were going to pause shipments in the US while a new plant was being built and then prices would double. And then put a picture of Trump underneat it captions "This is why we can't have nice things".

Re: manufacturing in poorer countries

"The US never had modern manufacturing engineering skills in the way China does"

I'm sure it did. It just didn't keep them modern.

Re: “plants …. China ..”

You do realise, don't you, that going bankrupt is a way to get somebody else to pay your costs.

Go ahead and ignore Patch Tuesday – it might improve your security

Re: There are a whole lot of factors.

I guess this means the Linux servers are being managed by Windows admins that don't realise all they have to do is run apt upgrade or its equivalent. Otherwise it's a case of telling me you know nothing about Linux without telling me you know nothing about Linux.

Microsoft pulls MS365 Business Premium from nonprofits

"Our goal ... is to ensure nonprofits can benefit from the industry leading solutions that are critical to ensuring the highest level of organizational security and productivity."

Good, public spirited approach.

As such, it is generously removing the ten licenses for Microsoft 365 Business Premium that it previously granted to non-profits.

So far so good. Then it all goes wrong talking about replacements.

AWS says Britain needs more nuclear power to feed AI datacenter surge

Re: If AWS want Nuclear power then

I think LLMs have created a new version: Good stuff in, Garbage out.

AWS are welcome to pay for the generators provided we get to keep them.

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

"Even more amazing than the Voyagers, is that someone went to the trouble to write a script that automatically gives me a thumb down for everything I post!"

Don't worry. It just means that something you posted was bang on target.

Anthropic’s law firm throws Claude under the bus over citation errors in court filing

Re: Latham & Watkins has implemented procedures

"take home all the profits"

A few costly and well-publicised failures and the profits will disappear.

Re: Being lazy ...

It used to be but they're expensive.

Having said that, a couple of us used to draft witness statements on the computer of the microspectrophotometer, print them out on the laser printer and then send them to the typists to be typed up using plain old mechanical typewriters on the correct stationery in the correct format or, as my colleague said, to get typing errors added.

70-knot winds so far blamed for yacht disaster that killed Brit tech tycoon Mike Lynch

Re: Wrong Target....

Aren't we always being told that the board's duty is to maximise return?

Re: Wrong Target....

And why you read the report before buying.

Coinbase extorted for $20M. Support staff bribed. Customers scammed. One hell of a SNAFU

Crypto currency and customers scammed. Tautology.