Posts by Grunchy

Mozilla's Firefox browser turns 20. Does it still matter?

I never cared for Chrome

Of course, I started with NCSA Mosaic on Mac and then dabbled with Emacs browser. I eventually bought my own computer, of course, and eschewed Internet Explorer in preference of Netscape Navigator.

Of course I’ve been using Firefox for 20 years. Tried Chrome, but was appalled at the memory hogging (and then just never tried it again).

Since I had switched to Ubuntu I mostly use Firefox, and occasionally fire up Thorium for problematic web sites (that are, frankly, distasteful).

I don’t see any practical use for A.I. at all: it’s a neat gimmick but it’s unpredictable and unreliable and just fundamentally useless.

And Then: most of my internet surfing is via Safari on my iPhone!

Killer app for AI is still years away, says industry analyst

Re: The killer app is crime

The killer app for crypto was actually rich people fleeing their home country. The “gotcha” was, sure you can leave, but you can’t just take your money and property with you: there is Departure Tax. But what if you emigrate safely away, leave behind all your possessions, then later arrange to have everything liquidated. You still can’t get money out of the country except by smuggling it, for which you are risking 100% seizure if not 100% theft. So this is why crypto is illegal in China and India, because people figured out an easy safe way to escape the oppressive regime yet keep all their ill-gotten riches.

If you want your mind blown…

…read what they were working on in 1982.

https://archive.org/details/omnibookofcomput0000unse

One guy was working on a mind-machine interface to create god-like genius powers.

I’d guess about 1/3 of the ideas haven’t come to fruition yet…

(I actually bought this book new back in 1982, but only got around to reading it recently; made some of my hairs raise! No, you can’t borrow my copy, come on. Download your own copy.)

Judge tosses publishers' copyright suit against OpenAI

Your comments are being slurped by AI

Since literally nobody learns to write except by reading someone else’s etchings it’s probably time to stop with the complaints already…?

Here’s Bill Kirchen doing EVERYTHING, maybe not intelligent, and not really that artificial either:

https://youtu.be/K2_Kp_q786g

(For wristwatches we discourage “counterfeit” in preference of “homage”!)

Winos4.0 abuses gaming apps to infect, control Windows machines

“The attack begins with a gaming-related lure...”

Sneaky! But what’s the lure?

Sadly, I feel like I might have been a victim. Many years ago, I succumbed to a gaming related lure: which would be space cadet pinball. And some guys used a 4-stage attack to take control of my pc. It suffered slowdown due to registry-fattening, spontaneous reboots and arbitrary updates. I felt helpless as days grew to years to decades! The latest virus doesn’t even play space cadet pinball anymore, you have to get an emulator or something just to launch that deadly gaming-related lure.

But that’s how I captured the virus, and control it. Once I started running Linux and Virt-Manager, I learned I could lock these viruses in nice little capsules. If they do anything mischievous I can shut them down and restore a snapshot.

Oh, don’t worry about the space cadet pinball. It still runs lo these many years gone by. Except now, the virus exists completely on MY terms mwa ha ha!

Canada closes TikTok's offices but leaves using the app a matter of 'personal choice'

Re: Trudeau the terrible tyrant

“ps: please restrain from ascribing US-style personality cults to Canadians.”

Counter-argument: Alberta Premiere Danielle Smith.

She’s about as pro-Trump, anti-vax wack-job as you can get!

Next Federal election who do we see, Poilievre (hate’im), Trudeau (despise’im), or Singh (don’t like’im).

Oh Rats another election where every single candidate is a terrible choice, why-oh-why can’t we allow voters to alternatively cast “negative votes” of opposition against their most despised candidate? It would have disqualified Trump AND Harris, but that’s ok, everybody hated both of em.

Yes I’m talking about r/PlebisciteBallot !!

Dangit!

Arecibo telescope might have failed because of weak sockets

Re: Failure in 3,2,1...

“No scientist is ever going there again.”

I wouldn’t be too sure. For example: I recently read a contemporary review of Darwin’s earthworm treatise, and am genuinely pleased to see on Google Earth that his sloped stony field behind the house is all still there pretty much as he had described.

(Makes one curious for a visit and dig around amongst the buried rocks for some of them Darwin Worms, best baiters ever. Perhaps next springtime?)

https://books.google.ca/books?id=GiIDAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&rview=1&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

Classic Outlook explodes when opening more than 60 emails

“…a part of me is of the opinion that if you open 60 emails at once then you sort-of deserve something bad to happen…”

I’m just wondering what kind of friggin gesture interface causes somebody to spontaneously bulk-select 60+ emails then execute some command, like “open,” on them.

This is the sort of modern ui baloney that causes my mom to call up and request I travel across the city and reverse/recover whatever disaster inadvertently happened.

It’s like, all you need to do is grip the screen in one weird way and it grabs all your email folders and forwards everything to Uncle Jake, or some damn thing.

Why we're still waiting for Canonical's immutable Ubuntu Core Desktop

I’m not a fan of ‘snap’

I “updated” from Ubuntu 22 to 24, and I regret it. They’ve enforced a lot more ‘snap,’ in particular the Firefox browser. Every bootup is “system error has occurred, share with Ubuntu?” I have no idea what the error is but I suspect it is ‘snap’. I use the Foxit pdf reader, and it is almost obscenely slow to respond. Even though Foxit is “tabbed,” each pdf opens in a new instance. I splurged on 128GB of ram so I could manipulate large data sets but I suspect the Ubuntu is sprawling large and wasting that resource. Another thing, the Nautilus file manager is becoming as buggy and unresponsive as Windows Explorer! There used to be a neat extension you could install and easily calculate Hashes for any file. Now Nautilus doesn’t even give you a file size in bytes.

I’m beginning to think I should switch to Debian, or Mint, or something.

The kicker was when I forced it to install the apt version of Firefox, and tried some of the hacks people are using to keep out the snap version, and it managed to undo all of that and go back to snap.

I have another chassis kicking around downstairs that I think is going to be trialling Mint if not Debian. Ubuntu 24 is definitely worse than 22 and I think cannot be undone, this descent into snap packages seems to be a bad direction. Thank goodness for alternate distros!

Relocation is a complete success – right up until the last minute

It seems to me Mr. Bean explored countless such scenarios.. Benny Hill suffered many similar mishaps but they were usually precipitated due to distraction by someone’s spectacular bosom!

Windows 10 given an extra year of supported life, for $30

"stop the useless patches"

I think I did this by installing the "ghost spectre," "Hallowe'en Edition" of Windows (both Win7 and Win10).

I don't think Microsoft can do any more updates? I'm not sure!

Anyway they are VMs, the 1st thing I did was take a snapshot and create numerous clones. I shared a folder from Linux via Samba, that's my transfer folder between sanctuary and all the Microsoft Wastelands. The Windows are isolated from the internet (and the network, for that matter): I don't let Microsoft go snooping around. If it sets off a self-destruct bomb, no sweat, I can easily restore the snapshot.

You know what, operating like this the last couple of years I have cheerfully forgotten how tyrannical Microsoft and Apple are. Because they aren't allowed to be any more, inside their tiny little cages!

US Army should ditch tanks for AI drones, says Eric Schmidt

This is what kills you

I remember the first solid-state accelerometer packaged as an integrated circuit. OF COURSE it was for military applications: inertial guidance munitions. Later it powered “It,” which became the self-balancing Segway. Then, the proliferation of hexacopters and remote-control drones.

This is the modern Terminator: defeatured, cost-reduced, minimized - automatic murder machine.

The US Armed Forces already has an autonomous anti-drone laser that can take out an individual flier in moments. But how big of a swarm do you need to overwhelm it? This is always the question regarding these “iron dome” technologies.

Russian spies use remote desktop protocol files in unusual mass phishing drive

They shut down the Calgary Library

Well, dunno if “they” did, but some Shit Head did.

It was a ransomware attack, evidently, which is interesting because it implies that the library had some stockpile of useful information (beyond the books themselves). The S.H. Gang may have been after passwords, or who knows. The library says they never got it.

What peeves me is they interrupted access to the shared “N.Y. Times” pass, which affects my ability to participate in the Wordle!

There Are Real World Consequences !!1!1 gosh dang it!

(Oh well I think I preferred the sudoku puzzles anyway, which are unrestricted.)

Apple quietly admits 8GB isn't enough in 2024, M4 iMac to ship with 16GB as standard

Just upgraded to Ventura!

I have practically no use for macOS, unfortunately. Well, macOS doesn’t “do anything” better, or different, than Ubuntu 24. Well, what the hay, another VM in the quiver, in case I ever feel the need to fire up “Xcode.” (Probably never.)

The open secret of open washing – why companies pretend to be open source

Re: OpenAI

I’m curious about just how many people here actually “use” OpenAI.

(Please downvote this post if you, personally, use OpenAI.)

Litmus test

It’s not “OSS,” it’s “FOSS.”

(If it’s not “free” then it’s not worth my while!)

Polish radio station ditches DJs, journalists for AI-generated college kids

A.I. Generated Story

“…though it looks like like a bid to save cash.”

Actually, it looks like like HAL-9000 got loose on the internets again!

(As if generative AI ever had the wherewithal to run it’s own pirate radio ! Shocking and appalling. I say good day to you sir.)

Woman stuck upside down under rock for hours after trying to retrieve dropped phone

Embarrassing

I’d get mad, then I’d go get my tool pouch, and then I’d get my gol-durn phone back.

It's about time Intel, AMD dropped x86 games and turned to the real threat

Re: Action at the eleventh hour

Shock surprise, ITANIUM II rises from the crypt.

Boo hoo ha ha!

Re: others' -> other's

I'll have an'other

..oo. hic ..

Biz hired, and fired, a fake North Korean IT worker – then the ransom demands began

Incompetent management

The company I used to work for was hit with a click bait virus, the virus got control of a workstation, the server was completely unregulated, the contents got scrambled over a weekend, AND the IT moron never heard of “backups.”

They got burned for $50,000. Also, the descrambling key didn’t work on everything (so a lot of CAD files were left corrupted).

But it was ok. Turns out the reason they had so much incompetence in management was because they were running their own “stolen intellectual property” scams. It’s hard to find competent staff that also has to be at least this much <======> unethical in order for your application to be considered.

(I blew the whistle with the association of professional engineers, now they are subject to frequent audit. Methinks “out of business” is their next play…)

WinAmp's woes will pass, but its wonders will be here forever

Foobar2k

Though I did appreciate Winamp being able to play MODs as well. Of course, I am referring to “Modplay” from the days of DOS.

One of the most “ear popping”, mind-blowing tracks would be Jogeir Liljedahl’s “Guitar Slinger,” which of course is (hopefully) immortal by now.

https://modarchive.org/index.php?request=view_player&query=42560

(I don’t worry about “obsolete” software, with virt-manager I can run any old version of Windows in a completely isolated sandbox, with full GPU hardware acceleration, and from there can run any old Windows software… all completely within Linux. If I ever feel like running Winamp, I’ll just run good old Winamp. I don’t care about “modern” operating systems anymore.)

California cops cuff suspect in deadly drone-assisted drug deal

Zombies

Zombie movies are actually about drug addicts.

(There’s nothing else to “figure out,” that was the only puzzle.)

Tesla FSD faces yet another probe after fatal low-visibility crash

Re: What a shock

Driving instructor here… the “anticipation” is the “P” in “SIPDE,” which stands for scan - identify - predict - decide - execute.

Which is asking a lot from a robot driver. Sure, it can scan (if a bird hadn’t soiled the sensor) and it can identify (it might distinguish among a few known shapes).

But as Python had taught, nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!

(I feel like Tesla doesn’t have a clear idea behind its FSD technology: what is their vision, is it HAL-9000? Is it Christine? Maximum Overdrive? “The Car”??)

Guilty

As a young inexperienced driver, I had my first accident: driving directly into an extremely bright sunset. Well, the guy ahead went round the corner, so I glanced left, saw I could make it too if I treadled it, which I did, then turned to look forward again and saw .. shadow?! Yeah, he couldn’t see into the sun either. Crunk.

(I generally have “ok” eyesight but my brain seems to be constantly looking out for skirts, legs, bosoms, and cops.)

MotorStorm AI

How come my PS3 can simulate an entire 3D world track environment plus vehicle and semi-convincing physics, and with its leftover processing power can simultaneously pilot up to 15 competing vehicles? And Tesla, with far greater processing power, struggles to control just one single car?

Pentagon stumped by mystery drone swarm flying over Langley Air Force Base

Re: the most sophisticated agencies on earth could not track them once they left

“The former commander of the the Langley Air Force Base in Hampton, Virginia, has revealed an unidentified drone swarm buzzed the facility for 17 days last December.”

Possibly a flock of seagulls? First they buzzed the base then they ran, they ran so far away…

Hobby King

Somebody’s gonna buy a “fun fly” stunt plane from Hobby King, rig it with 1 gallon jug of fruit cocktail and a one-way GPS wayfinder and is going to safely and courteously make deliveries to deserving individuals. Look, I didn’t invent it. Some guy already tried to serve Maduro with court documents at a street celebration via similar technique a couple years back.

Digital River runs dry, hasn't paid developers for sales since July

Krazy Krazy

We used to have Krazy Krazy store here in Western Canada, who went bankrupt (of course), but even up until the night before they locked the doors they were going hard to sign up layaway purchases.

So you go to Krazy Krazy to buy a VCR and they have one you want, but you can’t afford it right now, so the salesman guarantees to keep one for you if you start up a layaway purchase agreement, in which you leave them some money, and keep going back and pay a little at a time, until the whole purchase price is paid, and then you get the VCR (if they still had one).

Except if they go bankrupt, at which point you’re just another unsecured creditor who is never gettin’ anything.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krazy_Krazy

Is the first European on the Moon in ESA's astronaut corps?

In your mad rush to get to the moon, then you get there to the middle of a vast sterile deadly desert where there isn’t anything to do except die pathetically.

(WORSE THAN THAT: sitting in the space suit waiting to suffocate, and you realize your nose is itchy.)

One-year countdown to 'biggest Ctrl-Alt-Delete in history' as Windows 10 approaches end of support

Windows as a Linux app

I run Win10 inside a container in Virt-Manager on my Ubuntu workstation, I actually have several of them in there for various purposes. What I did was I created one VM with the “Ghost Spectre” edition of Win10 which is pared down to the bone of upgrades, security, all that nonsense; then cloned it about 6 times. I have a single share folder that Windows can see, through which all data enters the Microsoft environments, and which I safely backup each time I ever fire up Windows (WAY less frequently these days). If some hacker figures out how to hack my windows and damage something I can restore the snapshot in about 30 seconds.

It’s funny, I finally discovered the perfect environment in which to run Microsoft, and now I barely even use it anymore! Go figure.

Why send a message when you can get your Zoom digital video clone to read the script?

Re: Max Headroom called...

FUNNY. But the first thing I thought of was Lister being bedeviled by several forms of AI as the ship computer Holly, his dead roommate Rimmer, and the one that can actually rip him to shreds, Kryten.

The only other living creature is "cat," which could be imagination fabricated by insane psychosis.

For instance: I got an offer from LinkedIn in which I could pay for their AI to write for me job application letters, which would be received by AI "human" resource reviewers, and presumably the more I pay the more favorably the AI letters are received. Then, I began to feel insane psychosis kicking in...

FBI created a cryptocurrency so it could watch it being abused

“Looks like entrapment”

It looks more like a bait car.

(Speaking of cars: I am surprised by the duration of the ongoing “crypto.com” sponsorship scam of Formula 1. I still enjoy watching the racing spectacle because of two rules: 1. Never pay any fee to anybody to watch F1 races, 2. Never transact any business with any company associated with F1 in any capacity.)

You're right not to rush into running AMD, Intel's new manycore monster CPUs

Accelerated obsolescence

I have not bought “new” equipment for many years now, to be honest I already have far more compute power than I will ever need. It is with immense pleasure I drop by the local recycling depot and peruse the latest & greatest industrial computational equipment from a few years ago, often selling for 1% original cost OR LESS.

Don’t mind if I do!

Office 2024 unveiled for Microsoft 365 refuseniks

Libre Office

It’s not very compatible, but for my purposes it’s good enough. If I need 100% compatibility I can fire up virt-manager, boot into Win10, and run my olde Office 2007 which still runs same as ever.

I hate Microsoft now, I’m not updating anything anymore. I’m going FOSS.

John Deere accused of being full of manure with its right-to-repair promises

I haven’t shopped John Deere for decades now

I took my commerce elsewhere.

(Also, the “computer” they locked with proprietary algorithms is nothing but a PLC running glorified ladder logic. Guys are successfully rewiring their cars by disposing of those cost-cut “black box” brains and snapping in a home-built “speeduino”. I’d guess a small consortium or syndicate of farmers scrape up a little bit of bounty cash and set loose some hackers to sort out the John Deere mess, open-source the DIY alternative, and otherwise stop being a customer. Mazda has made heated seat resistors a subscription service, are you kidding me?! As if I don’t have a 12V cigarette lighter socket directly adjacent to the heater circuit. Also: just avoid Mazda, folks. Don’t be a loser!)

Cruise fined $1.5M for failing to report right away its robo-car dragged a pedestrian

Mars Robo Cars

They’ve got autonomous robot vehicles ripping around Mars at speeds up to, like, 1 mph! Because it would be a real disaster if they were to crash into no person nor any valuable property (kidding: more like 1/2 mile per WEEK).

I wonder how these robotaxi companies can just “let loose” their barely-in-control models at highway speeds with the barest comprehension of what’s around them let alone identifying people, property, hazards, etc. They have absolutely zero ethics. They’ve been menacing and killing people for years now, I’m glad somebody in law enforcement finally noticed the crimes being committed.

US Army orders next-gen robot mule to haul a literal ton of gear

Range Anxiety

If the device ran on diesel, it would probably be ok.

What if they made, like, a “general purpose” kind of vehicle, that could go almost anywhere while hauling some gear.

Even better if it had machine guns that popped out the taillights, and could emit a cloud of smoke, or puddle of oil, on command.

Now Dell salespeople must be onsite five days a week

Re: "The firings/floggings/beatings will continue until morale improves”

“they no longer see the employees as a source of their continued profitability…”

You know what I find interesting is how these companies one the one hand seek to divest themselves of the good old employees who already know how to do everything, yet on the other hand ask for the exact same experience education and credentials from the new hire.

They want to hire the exact same person as the guy they just fired, so long as it’s somebody else.

(Well I guess it’s obvious: they want the exact same person except the replacement works for a starter wage.)

10 nasty software bugs put thousands of fuel storage tanks at risk of cyberattacks

Ladder Logic

My relay network is completely and utterly unhackable. Well, for starters, it has no IP address…

US proposes ban on Chinese, Russian connected car tech over security fears

Re: Great first step...

I want a ban on ALL connected tech. I want, at bare minimum, any and all “connected” tech to include a mandatory option to be completely and utterly free from ALL connections.

That includes your friggin Apple, your friggin Microsoft, your friggin Sony, your friggin Google, your friggin WHOEVER!!

If your friggin tech can’t work unless it’s connected to your friggin company, then that tech device should be friggin BANNED.

End of line.

Ivanti patches exploited admin command execution flaw

What’s an “Avanti”

It’s some kind of Studebaker, or something?

I have no “clew” who uses it or for what. I have no basis for judging how relevant any of this is. The necessary evidence has not been “shewn.”

(I traverse the path in my butt-nosed Avanti like it’s sailing “threw” the cloud, coming in for a high-angle interception with a gigantic immovable rock! Or some-such.)

Kelsey Hightower: If governments rely on FOSS, they should fund it

Uh oh I smell a scam debacle brewing. Some swine is about to make a dirty deal with corrupt government officials to deliver some garbage public IT project that is going to be minimum 10x over budget and extend 3x beyond the project time span, accomplishing at best 25% of the agreed scope before being cancelled as a massive boondoggle and delivering absolutely nothing at all, and we learn in the forensic investigation that everything was hopelessly outdated and incompetently managed for every single second. And everybody responsible evades culpability by retiring to the Canary Islands.

Intel frees its Foundry biz – and that's just one of many major shake-ups today

Re: sales

The troubles extended back to itanium: a premium product developed to cash in on wealthy industrial customers (who were unexpectedly presented with a much cheaper yet equally as powerful 64-bit concept). Oh, the humiliation of Intel forced to adopt AMD64!

Intel was like the Evil Witch of West shrinking to a $90 billion emaciated shadow while AMD has swelled to a shaky $244 billion valuation. Intel isn’t exactly conquered, but battered and belittled.

Meanwhile nVidia is a $2,800 billion dollar target…

Much like 2009

Any factory is expensive to run and its output must be sold at sufficient profit or else it will go bankrupt.

Now suppose you had the misfortune to have bet your future on enormous gigafactories, but your product is suddenly 10 years old in the market…

Oracle urged again to give up JavaScript trademark

Jollyscript

I can get behind it, why can’t you?

(Not the Rancher; more the Roger).

Lebanon: At least nine dead, thousands hurt after Hezbollah pagers explode

Re: Conspiracy

“Funny that not so long ago I was heavily downvoted for saying that unfriendly state could install a backdoor in EV cars allowing it to remotely control the car causing it to crash or even cause battery to catch fire.“

I don’t see how this is far-fetched. The pagers beeped for several seconds prior to exploding, so there was a software hack that caused the pager to attract attention before blowing up in someone’s hands. Also a hardware hack to incorporate both the explosive and the trigger.

People scoff at the potential but the fact is many nations have forbidden Huawei from providing 5G network equipment. So why was that, if not because of some malicious activity?

Read it for yourself:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/huawei-5g-explainer-1.6461391

Bin Laden avoided cellular for years and years because he knew that’s how he would be identified and targeted. Modern EVs are the same, hell any GM has an On Star radio that can be used to surveil and target the vehicle just as it sits! This very publication has reported numerous times on the ability of hackers to attack and disrupt these very cars: this is fact, not fiction!

If bad actors can hack and booby trap a tiny little pager radio (or thousands of them), they can definitely do the same to an EV.

Re: Technology question

Someone remarked that "Hezbollah doesn't have the technical skills to figure this out".

Isn’t this that part of the world where they loaded hundreds of tons of volatile fertilizer into a storage silo in the middle of the city and left it there until it blew up?

China’s quantum* crypto tech may be unhackable, but it's hardly a secret

Re: old school

My favorite simple cipher is the “book cipher,” because nobody can possibly figure it out unless you know precisely which book is being referenced. Although I suppose you could just look for the most worn-out book on the shelf… (or, to foil that, pick anything from project Gutenberg).

My “fill the band” scheme goes like this: the ‘key’ is a seed value for some RNG that generates values up to 100. That number is the bit-count of noise bits per single data bit. So the message becomes up to 99% waste. Anyway, what you do is take the sparse data stream (data bits surrounded by random stretches of zeroes) and just pick random phrases, words, and letters that happen to have the same data bit set while filling in the emptiness with plausible information. Even better, every once in awhile you include within the message a special instruction to reset the RNG seed, etc.

(Of course this is a specialty cipher for particular people that want something more than commodity crypto. The algorithm can be as nuts as you want, and the plausible data could be audio, video, noise, repeating patterns, anything your imagination dreams up!)

Starlink U-turns, will block X in Brazil after all

You know what happens when you disrespect the court is you generally wind up paying a very hefty penalty. Even a ridiculously rich guy like Leon, his BBS company is suddenly banned from an entire country.

What is fascinating is when a COURT INSIDER like Giuliani goes, "Oh, Yeah??????" and doubles down, and doubles down, and doubles down.

And is punished so severely he finally shuts his fool mouth up!