* Posts by bombastic bob

10515 publicly visible posts • joined 1 May 2015

One-in-two JavaScript project audits by NPM tools sniff out at least one vulnerability...

bombastic bob Silver badge
Trollface

agreed on the 'noscript' usage, except this is NodeJS we're talking about (from what I read in the article), and so it's all server-side. Running 'noscript' has no effect on server-side stupidity JavaScript and its apparent bag of vulnerabilities.

Server-side JavaScript is its OWN target for snark, disdain, and generally being made fun of.

It may be poor man's Photoshop, but GIMP casts a Long Shadow with latest update

bombastic bob Silver badge
Meh

Re: Forget the geeky stuff, sort out the user experience.

"except most of the time they close all the toolboxes before closing whichever window that makes gimp actually close"

yeah some parts of the UI need [quite] a bit more user friendliness. I just tried that with a different login context, and had a little trouble getting the main toolbox back the way I wanted it.

bombastic bob Silver badge
Trollface

Re: Forget the geeky stuff, sort out the user experience.

"Why does everything have to be an effing "experience" these days"

This reminds me of a light bulb joke:

Q. How many 'Silly Valley' residents does it take to change a light bulb?

A. Three. One to actually change the bulb, and 2 to "share in the experience"

And I bet I answered your question, too.

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Forget the geeky stuff, sort out the user experience.

I use gimp a LOT. The only mildly irritating thing is that I have to 'export' to any format other than the 'gimp' format. But that's ok, once I understood the semantics of their menu, no big deal.

And I'm glad there's AN ACTUAL MENU and NO [profanity spew] RIBBON nor FAT-FINGER-BURGER. Well, in the versions I've been running on FreeBSD, anyway... (2.8.18 and 2.8.22, which work pretty well)

One thing gimp does lack is some of the things that MS Paint has always had, some of its line and curve generators and related things. Maybe if I worked with it some more I could figure out how to work around that...

Apache's latest SNAFU – Struts normal, all fscked up: Web app framework needs urgent patching

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Struts?

yeah I had to go look it up. checked out a tutorial. wasn't impressed. seems to have a lot of cruft in it. PHP would be easier (and probably faster to code) for the 'hello world' example.

Sorta reminds me of why I don't like C-pound. Or various HTML authoring tools.

/me goes back to hand-coding all HTML with a decent editor like 'pluma', without using _ANY_ Javascript. And just make the PHP backend do the work as needed.

Fire chief says Verizon throttled department's data in the middle of massive Cali wildfires

bombastic bob Silver badge

Re: What do you expect?

"How can folks fail to grasp this concept?"

Just because people disagree does NOT mean they do not 'understand'. Agreement is not the same thing as understanding. But you hear that kind of arguing, a form of 'ad hominem' attack on the intelligence of the person who disagrees, in desperation, from those who can't stand that others actually DISAGREE with their superior wisdom. Or whatever. [it reflects a bit of arrogance, I say]

Maybe that was in the contract, sure, but Verizon would've helped their own corporate image by UNCAPPING the data rate on a temporary basis during the emergency. Maybe THIS has to be part of every government cellular phone contract from now on?

So regardless of 'grasping the concept', Verizon blew a perfect opportunity to make their company look good, by greedily grubbing for pennies at the expense of missing the 'gold'.

That being said, the fire department ALSO blew it with their chosen data plan.

Plenty of 'fault' to go around.

bombastic bob Silver badge
FAIL

Re: Verizon: "We Can"

yeah their public perception profile is probably pretty poor at the moment

Verizon blew a great P.R. opportunity. "temporary upgrade" to help in an emergency.

And the fire department should've gotten an UNLIMITED plan for the firefighters. Then the problem would NOT have been 'a problem'.

Don't blame net neutrality for this. Even with Obaka's stupid FCC regs in place, Verizon could STILL throttle bandwidth if you went over your plan's data cap. This policy has not been affected at ALL.

[something that might make sense is a regulation that requires EMERGENCY SERVICES to NOT use any plan with a data cap, thus forcing phone companies to ONLY offer 'unlimited' plans]

Microsoft Visual Studio C++ Runtime installers were built to fail

bombastic bob Silver badge
Facepalm

Re: Why the need for complex installers in the first place.

"Complex installers are need for complex software."

too hard, smarter people, blah blah blah [remember _I_ wrote an installer >20 years ago and kept it up to date through every version of windows since '95].

You do NOT need a complex installer. You need something that a) finds an existing install, b) checks the version resource of anything it's about to install or remove and make sure that the thing you want to put there has the correct version (whatever that might be), and c) maybe add some registry entries or icons or whatever.

It's not that hard. Seriously.

Now when it comes to registration and all of that, COM DLL's already have a mechanism by which you can have the DLL register all of its stuff, and unregister it. There's an exported function [I forget what it's called] for each of those things. So you just have to call that function for each DLL. No big deal.

For the application itself, I generally add a command line option like '-install' or '-uninstall' that will let you use the application itself to set up "all that stuff". So if, like VLC, you associate a bunch of file types with your application, you PROBABLY already have a function in the executable to do that. Great! Call that when you do '-install' and un-do that when you call '-uninstall'. How hard is THAT?

Point is, it's NOT hard, it's surprisingly EASY, and almost brain-dead SIMPLE. You do _NOT_ need "a complex installer", particularly if you're NOT installing a monolithic ".Not" runtime and C++ shared lib installer that requires 2 reboots and a prayer (and a sacrificial chicken) to get your system up and running.

icon, because, *FACEPALM* [but your point reflects what Micro-shaft WANTS you to think, so you're forgiven for buying into their FUD and drinking their coolaid because you didn't know better].

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Why the need for complex installers in the first place.

LGPL can be satisfied by wrapping their library with your own API or DLL that encapsulates what they do. You make a copy with your name on it, open source the library, wrap it with what you need to do, and ship YOUR binary, open sourcing it as needed to comply with licensing. Not a problem, really. been there, done that, with jpeg as I recall. And your DLL, of course, is statically linked with the run-time. So no other dependencies [aka potential cock-ups].

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Probably finding it difficult to recreate the installers

I put my own installer on github a while back. There are others, too. FREE ones. Mine's so brain-dead simple to use it could make anyone who's ever used InstallShield or tried to program for MSI cry...

(too bad I suck at marketing or I would've pwned it 15 years ago)

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

"get rid of the runtime installers entirely and keep things clean with a single .dll, like mingw manages to do."

better still: STATICALLY LINK the run-time and everything else within your application. NO external dependencies. Problem Solved!

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Reminds me of why I stopped using IE back in the day

"It was one hell of a wake-up call."

Welcome aboard!

Safe surfing:

a) never use a Micro-shaft browser

b) avoid using windows if at all possible

c) only surf the web while logged in as a non-privileged user, ideally not the same one you do your wok as, NEVER 'root' or 'administrator' or similar.

d) use plugins like 'noscript' to avoid running javascript whenever possible. Most of it is ads and tracking anyway.

e) *NEVER* preview e-mail in HTML. *NEVER*. In fact, don't use HTML for e-mail at ALL, and view as plain text ONLY. This destroys the effectiveness of scammer e-mails, since they often leverage HTML to do their phishing, click-baiting and tracking. Thunderbird lets you turn off HTML in e-mail.

f) *NEVER* "install this" to view the content

g) NEVER install a flash plugin (use HTML5 only for media)

h) don't read PDF files within the browser; use an external application NOT written by Adobe or Micro-shaft (a recent vulnerability on this one proves I'm right about this).

and so on.

These simple rules, or ones similar to them, will help to protect you against nearly all of the known exploits, and probably most of the zero-day exploits.

But you discovered the most important one on your own: *NEVER* use a Micro-shaft browser!

bombastic bob Silver badge
Trollface

Re: Seriously

Thanks, and don't call me 'Sirius Lee'

(ha ha ha)

bombastic bob Silver badge
Megaphone

Re: Why the need for complex installers in the first place.

"The disaster that is COM has a lot to do with it."

Now, now, don't go blaming COM for this undead 'DLL Hell' problem. COM works when it's implemented properly, but not the same way that so many people have ABused it by polluting the registry with everything and its grandmother.

Instead, you can blame LAZY DEVELOPERS for thinking "an application" equals "slap together a bunch of shared libraries and shared components" VB-style. And pollute the registry with the 'registration' of all of those said shared components and libraries with their unnecessarily large number of COM objects that you'll never use.

2 words: STATIC LINK. This avoids the entire problem. That includes static linking runtime into your DLLs. Then, actually using COM, or something like it, to talk to your own DLLs avoids having to rely on globals allocated using shared runtime - how about THAT! You don't need to use Micro-shaft's "class factory" nonsense either if you have your OWN object constructor within the DLL that knows what the 'new' operator is for... as a simple API function of your own design.

So, when some stupid downloaded game or "dancing gopher app" breaks the C/C++ run-time and/or MFC shared DLL's, you know that *MY* application will NOT be affected, because *I* went through the trouble of making sure there were NO dependencies on ANY of that! And the executable size is only about 200k more, if I do it right.

Seriously, Micro-shaft TOTALLY SCREWED the whole 'shared lib' concept a long time ago. You might as well just statically link. Your application will LOAD FASTER, it will RUN CLEANER, you won't be getting that midnight phone call because "Phil installed a game and now your application won't work and we need it yesterday".

And, you WON'T be relying on the "Micro-shaft's installer" for YOUR success!

You want how much?! Israel opts not to renew its Office 365 vows

bombastic bob Silver badge
IT Angle

Re: I think you just put yours in the shredder

@ }{amis}{

you used the word 'feel' twice. perhaps you should *THINK* instead?

(then you'd realize that the alleged 'human rights abuses' by Israel are just Islamist propaganda)

Use Debian? Want Intel's latest CPU patch? Small print sparks big problem

bombastic bob Silver badge
Trollface

Re: Shrug

Shirley you jest!

I'd rather listen to vogon poetry than watch Debian do the 'silly walk' like that.

bombastic bob Silver badge
Facepalm

Re: Section 3

Debian is shooting themselves in the foot by not at least putting the update into the 'non-free' package distribution...

what, is Stallman behind this or something? Sounds like something he'd do/say...

/me imagines a bunch of hippies at a Santa Cruz beach wearing peace sign necklaces, love beads, psychadelic tie-dyed shirts, beaded headbands, and carrying protest signs worthy of the Laugh-In wall, talking like Tommy Chong and complaining that "Intel isn't giving us what we want, man!"

Debian, and every other distro depending on you: GET A CLUE! Just put the package into 'non-free' and be DONE with it!!!

icon, because, *FACEPALM*

Facebook brings banhammer down on over 650 pro-Iranian 'fake news' accounts

bombastic bob Silver badge
Black Helicopters

Re: I don't get it.

Fa[e]ceB[ook,itch] mistreats and tries to censor/silence conservatives all of the time, or so it would seem.

Now others that they (FB) don't like are (apparently) getting similar treatment.

The ban-hammer is on whomever they *FEEL* deserves it. [well, it IS their network, but they need to be HONEST about it, right?]

so yeah don't use Facebook if you want freedom

And YOUTUBE apparently does it, too... ('shadow bans' and 'demonetizing' practices, etc.)

(if ever there were a threat of 'corporatocracy', it'd be Facebook and Google and Micro-shaft doing it).

.NET Core 2.1 – huh, yeah – what is it good for? Bing, apparently

bombastic bob Silver badge
Linux

"It's a funny world when I can wholeheartedly recommend .Net devs to migrate their sites to Ubuntu."

I'd suggest weaning off of ".Not", too. They can thank me later.

bombastic bob Silver badge
Flame

Re: What is JIT good for?

not to be anal retentive, but Java is typically a compiled language, generating a P-code [or sometimes native] binary. JavaScript, on the other hand, requires a JIT compiler because

*ahem*

so-called JavaScript "developers" *FELT* that their own signfiicance was too little on 'teh intarwebs', and so they were COMPELLED to invent/inject B.S. javascript "code" into EVERYTHING web-related, from server to client, particularly when related to AD SERVERS, because, tracking. And so it's everywhere, and the more lazy J.S. "developers" propagate it via the use of CDN-delivered bloatware libraries (like JQuery, NodeJS).

And so these bloatware libraries take SO long to interpret, that their bloat-code runs slow, so they invented JIT compilers for both client and server side to try and 'compensate'. Nevermind the ENTIRE MODEL is flawed to begin with, as evidenced by a particular worthless function being pulled by a developer, causing chaos throughout the user base. And so on.

ok - rant complete. applying fire extinguisher now.

bombastic bob Silver badge
FAIL

"It is showing off how far the framework has come gone

fixed it for you. They have 'gone too far' I would imagine. I've always *HATED* ".Not" especially for the desktop world (and that 'C-pound' language that goes with it).

maybe it has a tiny amount of sense on the server end (as compared to other silly things like NodeJS). however, you'd do a LOT better with native C code built as custom apache modules [for example], or just do some really clever PHP code instead, limit the bloat, call external C programs to do the REAL work, leverage CGI, etc. and make the system overall efficient _INSTEAD_ of, well, ".Notty"... AND portable across multiple operating systems!

/me wonders if their 'comparison' was a windows server using old code against a windows server running tweeked code. How about comparing it against a LINUX or FreeBSD server running Apache (or any OTHER web server for that matter) with well written NATIVE code?

Apple web design violates law, claims blind person

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: To put it mildly.

"Even for a person with normal sight, the Apple website isn't the most efficient place to compare Apple products"

Ack. And these so-called "modern design" web sites have color combinations (light blue on bright white, for example) that are HARD ON THE EYES.

yeah, how about [*joke*] considering "old eyes" a DISABILITY so we can SUE them into compliance! I bet the millenial SJW's would spin in place over not being able to take sides... like a permanently unresolved quantum state or something.

/me ponders new energy resource - spinning millenial SJW's - now how to collect and put it on the power grid...

Python wriggles onward without its head

bombastic bob Silver badge
Unhappy

Django "providing a way forward" ? ew.

From the article:

"Hettinger believes examples of good governance in various Python projects, like Django and Project Jupyter, provide the core language developers with a way forward."

I've seen Django, and had to fix things written for it. Without going into a slam-fest about it, I'd simply say that having Django drive where Python is going would be like Chrome and JQuery driving where web sites are going [whoops, too late!] and the results will be both DISMAL _AND_ PREDICTABLE.

I have to wonder how much the former "Benevolent Dictator' was doing to STOP the bad things, though...

Whenever Python becomes _SO_ "object oriented" and "feature rich" that it needs its OWN OPERATING SYSTEM to run, then you'll know I was right. It goes against the Unix Philosophy and, as such, is likely to implode from its own growing mass.

Mozilla accuses FCC of abdicating its role, ignoring comments in net neutrality lawsuit

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

"controversial decision to tear up existing net neutrality rules"

More like:

its somewhat controversial decision to de-regulate by removing alleged 'net neutrality' rules put into place for political reasons by the previous administration.

Fixed it for ya.

'Teh Intarwebs' worked fine without these 'existing' (read: added) rules prior to 2009, so why appear to lose all sanity over their removal?

The sun continues to rise. The birds continue to sing. Paychecks appear on payday (and in the USA, with more 'take home' money in them). People are hiring, so you're no longer 'stuck' in your dead-end job with no upward mobility. Overall, things seem to be at LEAST as good as they were, if not even better. Why complain about it?

Microsoft: We busted Russian Fancy Bear disinfo websites

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Microsoft: internet police

Micro-soft, "FEEL" YEAH!

Making the world safe on 'teh intarwebs'

Micro-soft, *FEEL* YEAH!!

etc.

(where are the 'South Park' creators, I've got a great idea for their new movie)

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: How things have changed

"Russia is the new Evil Empire rather than Microsoft."

'more evil than us, lookie lookie lookie! we are no longer the bad guys' - heh

It's like over at M.S. they're all doing the "side step" and distracting everyone with 'new, shiny' - that's right, because wearing the 'shiny gold belt buckle' drop item will distract the floor boss long enough to get in a one-hit kill on the boss (instead of a total party kill on the players).

I think it was REALLY 'Anonymous' pretending to be the CIA pretending to be China pretending to be Russia... [for the lulz, now laughing at Micro-shaft]

In all seriousness, though, doesn't this sound a little *too* convenient? And, also, a little *too* insignificant to be of any _REAL_ importance...

a) thinking that Russians try to hack U.S. political organization to create chaos: plausible

b) thinking that Russians are targeting anti-Trump Republicans because they're anti-Trump: possible, but not very effective [they'd get more out of 'chaos' to get people to mistrust the electoral process]

c) implying that Trump is colluding with these alleged Russian hackers because "doing that" would have any significant effect: illogical; highly unlikely

d) making this point as if it's significant because Mueller's report is going to be out soon, and Micro-shaft's official company political position [for evidence watch [P]MSNBC for 5 minutes, if you can stomach it] DEMANDS that as much NEGATIVITY as POSSIBLE regarding Trump continue INDEFINITELY, including Mueller's witch-hunt "investigation": GUARANTEED

So phar, so FUD: PHP flaw puts WordPress sites at risk of hacks

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Good alternatives to WordPress?

well here's what I do: I have local copies of everything and web servers handy to test stuff if I need to. Then you use scp or sftp or some other means to copy files onto the actual web server. In one case, for a customer site, it used a private github repo [which is extremely convenient that way - test on another server, then do pull request to main repo, then 'git pull' on the server plus whatever other post-pull stuff you gotta do and it's automatically backed up in the cloud].

Some of these solutions require shell access. In the case of my company web site, which I've had since the mid 90's, I use sftp to transfer files from my local repo to the server. [then I only have to use their 'control panel' stuff to manage things like e-mail addresses and DNS entries].

*REAL* html coders can do it with pluma. Or vi. (and without ANY scripting!)

Your Phone prematurely ejected, Skype texting on the way, and 900 more years of Windows

bombastic bob Silver badge
Trollface

Re: Skype texting

yeah - with auto-emoji that has motion in it for "the usual ASCII art"

bombastic bob Silver badge
Meh

Re: Sticky notes pre-dates WinXP

as long as it doesn't show up as part of a desktop package under Linux, with ".Not" aka Mono dependencies (like Tomboy - I can't say enough *BAD* things about *THAT* cluster-blank), I don't care about any 'sticky notes'. It just sounds like another 'gimmick feature' that will die a horrific death on its own, without any intervention.

bombastic bob Silver badge
Unhappy

Re: 900 years

'Windows 10 Uber Alles!' <-- echoes in the Halls of Redmond

And will it be 2D FLATSO 'The Metro" light blue on bright white [aka eye-killing] ADWARE+SPYWARE with forced updates 900 years from now? Or will they come up with EVEN WORSE THINGS to HORRIFY us?

Boss regrets pointing finger at chilled out techie who finished upgrade early

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: The boss owned up? Apologised, even?

I actually had this happen when I was in the military.

I was on a submarine for about 4 years. At the time, I was one of the most senior people on board. The boat was a fairly new class of submarine, and had a different kind of propulsion plant than most of the rest of the fleet. Our engineer had moved on (with a promotion) and so we had a new engineering officer who was pretty 'green' with respect to our power plant. Some of his decisions reflected that, telling us NOT to do things we've always done before etc..

Well we were running engineering drills for the upcoming annual examination, and because of a stuck valve, I was told (by the engineer) to do something that violated a procedure. It posed no actual danger, but it violated the procedure. So I told him that (but I couldn't remember where in the procedure it said NOT to do this, I just remembered it). He said to do it anyway. I offered alternatives that were allowed by procedure. He said "I'm not going to XXX because of YYY". I asked for a watch relief. He got angrier, said we weren't going to do that in the middle of yotta yotta yotta. So I logged that the engineer ordered me to do that thing, and I made DAMNED sure it didn't pose a danger to human lives or equipment (it was only for about 10 minutes anyway).

Then later, it really bugged him that one of his senior people would be so insistent (even though nobody else was) so he went looking for where it said NOT to do that, and discovered that we were supposed to shut down the reactor under the condition he told me to operate it under [remember there was no actual danger, I made sure of it]. Well, somewhat embarrassed by this, he did the right thing: he called me in personally, apologized, and then held 'all hands' training on it. No doubt an 'incident report' was also filed. [again there was no real danger, it was just a violation of the procedure, which was intended to protect against a different possible condition that wasn't present, and would NOT be with my hand on the controls]. And of course, we didn't get the engineering 'E' award that year, either [but didn't fail our annual exam].

Yeah, oops.

Unfortunately, the engineer wasn't any easier to work with after that. He was actually a bit [more] overcautious. He should have trusted his people more. But I was the _ONLY_ person in the engine room that understood that what he wanted us to do was against the procedure. Had I said nothing, we would have FAILED the annual examination, which is a _LOT_ _WORSE_ than what happened.

And it wasn't THAT bad of a situation, because if it WERE, the engineer would've been 'fired'. He wasn't. He actually got promoted on schedule, from what I understand. So yeah no danger, just an "I *blanked* up" on his part.

Now you can tell someone to literally go f--k themselves over the internet: Remote-control mock-cock patent dies

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Unencumbered by patents

says "implementation in C pound" - heh, not surprised, really

bombastic bob Silver badge
Joke

syntax error - you forgot the ; at the end

What happens to your online accounts when you die?

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Society devolving back to feudalism

"And the primary driving force behind this devolution is intellectual monopoly."

no, it's the willingness of people to surrender a part of their freedom to others, i.e. to "the elite", whether it's governments or corporations. Certain "evil" corporations are only just a PART of that, when driven by motives that are NOT "give the customer what he wants and make a profit". When it becomes "drive the customer to do what WE want, and make them PAY US FOR IT" - that's the problem.

Right, Microsoft?

Boffins build the smallest transistor, controlled by an atom

bombastic bob Silver badge
Boffin

Re: 1 atom switched junction <> 1 atom wide junction.

I'm actually curious about switching speeds here. If we can't go faster, what's the point?

Current tech limits us to under 4Ghz for the most part (yeah overclockers, but still). I always figured it would be 3Ghz, but it's gone all the way to 4Ghz. 4Ghz has a wavelength of less than 8cm and so in theory for a single clock cycle read transaction, you need a distance of 2cm or less between whatever on either end [to allow for switching and propogation etc.]. You mght get away with 4cm, but that's the speed of light we're talking about, and you can't exceed it. So yeah clocking along at 4Ghz generally means no more than 2cm between any 2 points that have to talk to each other at that speed.

Atom-sized transistors, therefore, could speed this up by compressing the size significantly. You'll still need a way to get the RAM physically closer to the L2 cache, though, so you can at least read it at the full clock rate. 2cm isn't very big, and that's only 4Ghz.

Now, HOW fast can this gel-substance switch at?

GitHub goes off the Rails as Microsoft closes in

bombastic bob Silver badge
Meh

I'm still in 'wait and see' mode

I still have stuff on github, and am not planning on moving it any time soon. It's just a place to put things, really. The 'issues' system can be helpful, and I've contributed to other projects with it [submitted pull requests].

None of that seems to have changed.

And so I'm still in 'wait and see' mode, making sure that none of that is LOST or corrupted by "microsoft-isms", too many mousey-clickey motions or the requirement to use a ".Not"-based plugin or C-pound or something equally *HIDEOUS*. As long as they don't go there, I guess I'll be, uh, 'happy' with github.

Net neutrality freaks furious over lack of fury at FCC hearing

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Government failing the populace

"I have yet to see any rational argument supporting the reversal of Net neutrality"

1. government take-over of the internet is NOT good for freedom. They will censor, block, harass, snoop, force encryption back doors, and filter speech, given the opportunity. "for the children" etc. It's what they do. In the name of political correctness.

2. de-regulation works by getting the 'brick walls' and 'roadblocks' OUT of the way of for-profit industries to serve their customers as best as they can, while still making a profit.

3. If you want to fix problems with infrastructure in unprofitable areas, allow the ISPs to charge MORE for service. Then they'll be able to afford it. Otherwise it's a WELFARE PROGRAM.

4. Preventing someone from buying a "fast lane" (i.e.prioritization) is like forcing EVERYONE to be EQUALLY MEDIOCRE.

5. Net neutrality is not about equality of service. It's about GOVERNMENT CONTROL. The end result can ONLY be mediocrity for everyone, because NOBODY can "get better". Except for the elite. Because some are MORE equal than others, like in 'Animal Farm' by George Orwell.

The Trump admiinistration de-regulates, cuts taxes, etc. - exactly what Pai did for that ridiculous "net neutrality" nonsense that was anything _BUT_ "net neutrality" - and the economy BOOMS forward, making the ENTIRE WORLD better off. It's a work in progress, but it's got a nice running start, and you know what's happening if you keep your eyes open and don't allow 'fake news' to tell you that you're not seeing what you're seeing every day. De-regulation works, tax cutting works, getting gummint out of the way works. Freedom works. That's the point.

One factoid I heard about on the Rush Limbaugh show yesterday - that apparently, download speeds have DOUBLED since the dropping of the so-called 'net neutrality' nonsense. Imagine THAT! And yet you'll NEVER hear about it on the lame-stream news. I was pleasantly surprised.

Windows 10 Linux Distribution Overload? We have just the thing

bombastic bob Silver badge
Meh

I still think they're majoring in the minors. again.

Yeah, it may have a cool/geek factor to manage "all these Linux distros", but it's still Win-10-nic, it's still lipstick on the NON-OINKY end of the BOAR, and it's STILL Micro-shaft doing the "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish" thing.

(this new, shiny feature is part of "Extend")

Now - tell me how this helps my day to day operations. Yeah, thought so.

Were they spending an EQUAL amount of effort on a Wine-like subsystem that RUNS ON LINUX, so we could use windows applications on a Linux system DIRECTLY without having to use Win-10-nic, I'd be TRULY impressed!

Or, just get rid of the 2D FLATSO "the Metro" slurp/ad/track in Win-10-nic, and make it look like 7. yeah, fat chance, right?

If you drop a tablet in a forest of smartphones, will anyone hear it fall?

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Niche item

yeah I've built a couple of prototype devices to demo a concept for one particular customer using an inexpensive fondleslab as a control device (in lieu of a front panel). A $$ 'droid slab will do what a $$$ screen does, and you can walk around the room with it...

Boffins get fish drunk to prove what any bouncer already knows

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: so they drink like a fish?

spiders on drugs? [I checked out that link, it had an interesting photo - "this is your web" "this is your web on various kinds of drugs" - the 'caffeine' one was appropriately 'tweeked']

Charlotte's Psychadelic Web. heh.

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Hey!

everyone in the diet-science world loves to blame caffeine! (whereas I rely on it to stay awake - the world can be a really boring place, sometimes)

found this on teh intarwebs a long time ago: "It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion. It is by the beans of Java that thoughts acquire speed, the hands acquire shakes, the shakes become a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion."

I should try the alcohol and taurine thing, though, just to make sure. You know, taurine is named 'that' because it comes from beef, right? So alcohol and a nice steak? Or maybe Tequila and an energy drink?

Boffins blame meteorites for creating Earth's oldest rocks

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Pedant Alert

I didn't know British singular/plural grammar rules were any different...

(as long as the 'singular they' isn't used, I'm ok with it)

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

Re: Confused

wasn't the entire earth formed by a bunch of dirt, dust, and rocks colliding and collecting together to form a gravity well, and eventually the planet? So what's the point, here?

So yeah EVERYTHING was once 'a meteor'

I'm also not really happy with uranium vs lead isotopic dating. It more or less assumes that the lead content came entirely from the uranium. Unless we have a baseline of the content ratio from the exploding star that probably created it, you can only guess.

Patch Tuesday heats up with pair of exploited zero-days squashed – plus 58 other vulns fixed

bombastic bob Silver badge
Stop

Re: Far Too Little Much Too Late is a Sub Prime Action in a Failed Program

and who still uses anything by Adobe [that isn't a decade or so old] ?

Flash Player - people STILL use that?

Acrobat Reader - I bought a re-conditioned PC a couple of years ago [came with Win 7, 'while I could get one' basically] and it had Acrobat Reader pre-installed.

THE @#$%'ing THING WANTED ME TO LOG INTO IT AND REGISTER MY E-MAIL ADDRESS! Bit-bucket.

Democrats go on the offensive over fake FCC net neut'y cyberattack

bombastic bob Silver badge
Megaphone

Re: Pai is still damaging society

How many times does the liberally biased concepts that were labeled as "net neutrality" (which isn't neutrality) need to be explained before it becomes OBVIOUS that removing Obaka-era regulations from a 'bounds overstepping' FCC was a *GOOD* thing?

The intarwebs survived for a couple of DECADES without such regulation, which basically threatened to prevent someone from PAYING EXTRA to get prioritized traffic. That means EVERYONE EQUALLY MEDIOCRE. That's like SOCIALISM. Except, in socialism, "the elite" will ALWAYS 'get theirs'.

If ISPs can allow providers to PRIORITIZE, and they pay EXTRA to do it, or allow CUSTOMERS to "get priority traffic" at that higher priority (by paying extra), as long as the overall average isn't screwed over in the process, then EVERYONE will WIN. It THEN becomes a matter of choice, as to "which brand" you want, effectively. Otherwise we'll all be stuck with PRICE CONTROLS, effectively, and NO choice.

But this was about ONLY "the elites" getting THEIRS, and forcing "the masses" to have "the mediocre". THIS is the evils of socialist thinking, because you're not helping by trying to EQUALIZE OUTCOMES. Those who EARN more should be able to SPEND MORE to get BETTER. This is the incentive to EARN MORE. If there's no point in earning more, why bother? Then things start to stagnate, PARTICULARLY in the overall economy, and you ultimately get VENEZUELA.

Instead, I'd like to choose between getting a Chevy or a Cadillac. If I can afford the Cadillac, I should be able to get that if I want it. Or if I can't, get the Chevy. NO point in forcing ALL Cadillac owners to ONLY be able to get the Chevy.

That is, unless you're one of those anti-1% fascists SOCIALIST types...

(if you work hard, prepare yourself, take the risks, and BECOME "one of the 1%" shouldn't you be able to KEEP THE REWARDS of the preparation, hard work, and risks?)

Pai (and the Trump administration) is *RIGHT* about _REMOVING_ so-called "net neutrality" regulations from the FCC. It was WRONG to have done it in the FIRST place.

It's official: TLS 1.3 approved as standard while spies weep

bombastic bob Silver badge
Mushroom

Re: no-brainer for sysadmins

The first thing _I_ thought of was, am I going to be *FORCED* to use a browser that has Australis and a 'hamburger menu' button? Because I don't want to be _FORCED_ into using FF 57 or later due to this...

(I really _HATE_ the Metro-Centric 2D FLATSO CRAPWARE)

Dropbox plans to drop encrypted Linux filesystems in November

bombastic bob Silver badge
Devil

if feature maintenance is a problem...

if feature maintenance is a problem, then re-design the thing so that maintaining such "features" is no longer required. Works on all platforms, using a common method. Simple, right?

How does 'rsync' do ITS magic? They should JUST do that. makes sense to me.

[as I understand it, rsync compares file size and SHA hash - if they differ, it needs to be sync'd - and source control systems have well-tested methods of storing/tracking version info if you need that, too]

this makes me consider that a paid-for github repo would make for good off-site backup, too... [or NOT github if you want a non-Microsoft solution]

Linux 4.18 arrives fashionably late while Zorin OS shines up its Windows

bombastic bob Silver badge
Unhappy

not sure if I want to fork over money...

not sure if I want to fork over money for a Linux OS to *STOP* looking like Win-10-nic. Devuan with mate, or Mint out of the box, is SO much easier.

When I read the title of the article, I had considered making fun of it looking like Win-10-nic, something about "windows 10 and Unity had a baby, and IT! IS! UGLY!!!" or something similar.

Now I'm just sad.

Just to clarivy: I believe that forking over money for something of value, like a support contract, or business-friendly features, is not a bad thing. RH and others have a business model for that. But like 'Lindows' aka 'Linspire' from a decade or so ago, subscription models to get UPDATES, or "pay extra for these features you REALLY want", are kinda bad. So yeah it's their business model I don't like.

at least if they do like Linspire/Lindows did, and convince some computer-makers to ship with their OS pre-loaded, you would know Linux supports the hardware and THEN just install whatever Linux flavor you want after it arrives. I did that with inexpensive Linspire boxen back in the day...

Hello darkness my old friend, what happened last week in Redmond?

bombastic bob Silver badge
Trollface

Re: Skype? Ha ha ha!

"believes that another application is using the web cam"

that's just the spyware. you can ignore it being there. It won't watch you doing anything that you don't want posted on 'teh intarwebs' if you don't send 5,000 bitcoin to a particular wallet...

bombastic bob Silver badge
Mushroom

Re: Dark Theme on Win10?

"Win10 is a dumbed down garbage GUI, designed for monochrome laser reports, not usability. Breaking everything they learnt about GUI from Win 3.1 to Win7. Vista or XP you could make it like Win2K / Win98 / NT 4.0."

Micro-shaft is WASTING THEIR TIME (and our patience!) by 'Majoring in the Minors' with their chosen "improvements" in the UI. See icon.

I would GREATLY prefer a 3D SKEUOMORPHIC THEME that doesn't have light blue on white as the default UI colors for the "The METRO" CRapps. How about a 'Windows 7' look? Or XP? Or 2K?

As for that light blue on bright white nonsense - here's some actual EVIDENCE of what I've been *SCREAMING* about for a while - it's VERY bad for your eyes!