Posts by zero2dash

VMs: Imperfect answers to imperfect problems, but they're all we have

Re: good article

“All that a hypervisor is is an application running on top of an OS.”

If it’s a Type 2 Hypervisor, yes.

“The hypervisor in Workstation is actually the same hypervisor they compile for OS X, ESXi, etc.”

Incorrect.

Workstation is a Type 2 Hypervisor, same as Parallels and VirtualBox.

ESXi is a Type 1 Hypervisor, same as Hyper-V. Yes, even Hyper-V when running “on top” of Windows is a Type 1, because the OS you see is actually running on top of Hyper-V itself when you add the role/feature.

https://searchservervirtualization.techtarget.com/feature/Whats-the-difference-between-Type-1-and-Type-2-hypervisors

https://superuser.com/questions/836116/hyper-v-appears-to-runs-on-top-of-the-host-os-so-why-is-it-considered-a-native

I’ve always been a tinkerer, so VM’s have always been handy to use to experiment with. Now that I am on a team managing a large company with SCCM and WSUS, VM’s are a necessity.

What's your flava? Ooo, tell me what's your flava... of Ubuntu

Re: Wake me up...

"would run Linux full-time at the drop of a hat, if I could get some serious [graphic design] work done with it"

I use Inkscape, GIMP, and Scribus now instead of CC, "get some serious [graphic design] work done", and get paid for it. Have had no downtime or issues once learning my way around all the apps. I'm still in Win7, but all 3 apps are available in Linux.

Actually prefer the 3 to CC, especially Scribus, which is a lot better at PDF form creation than InD was.

Not sure what you're doing that you consider GIMP a non-worthwhile Photoshop alternative... then again, I'm mainly in the vector art business in AI & Inkscape. GIMP still does exactly what I need it to do, same as PS before it. No complaints.

Farewell Unity, you challenged desktop Linux. Oh well, here's Ubuntu 17.04

MATE

They should've went with MATE, since MATE is based on GNOME 2 which is what Ubuntu used before they pushed Unity on everyone.

Oh well, at least DE's are easy to add to any distro, or obviously you can pick a different flavor of the distro.

MATE is easily my favorite DE after trying Cinnamon, GNOME (3), Budgie, XFCE, KDE, and Unity.

Windows updates? Just trust us, says Microsoft executive

Surely no one is this daft

“...organisations should rely on Microsoft...”

“...sometimes we release updates that break something...”

You sir are a special kind of stupid, one that is largely unseen and the stuff of legend.

Microsoft paid me $650 to scrub Windows 10 from my grandpa's PC, says man

He shouldn't have been caused ANY grief; his system (and everybody else's systems) shouldn't have been touched.

He said he didn't want the upgrade. IE "leave my machine the hell alone"

This is on Microsoft. Why should he be overburdened with installing a new OS on his hardware that he paid for, with an OS that he paid for, that is set up like he wants it - just to avoid MS having to acknowledge and respect the decision he made - with what he had at the time which was working perfectly for him?

'Windows 10 nagware: You can't click X. Make a date OR ELSE'

If it wasn't for distrowatch and realizing how great Ubuntu is (which will soon be taking over all my machines), I think I'd honestly and admittedly just pirate Win7 Enterprise as payback for them continuing to try to snooker me into upgrading my 7 Pro machines. Hey MS: GFY.

Microsoft warns of worm ransomware, finds fix in Windows 10 upgrade

Re: Appears a lot of 11 year old girls are posting.

Not upgrading to Win10 ≠ not wanting to fix a problem.

Apparently you don't know the definition of a "trojan horse".

Forgetting about the questionable telemetry and encrypted data transmission - if you're OK with your OS removing your ability to control updates, thereby changing >20 years of policy, then by all means enjoy.

Home users shouldn't have to concede control over their own bought & paid for hardware just to satisfy the whims of whatever blowhard is the flavor of the month at MS. If you think for one second that MS has never published and released an update (or a few dozen) that have 'never' hosed machines rendering them non-bootable, well I've got ocean front property in AZ to sell you. Heck, there are still unresolved issues with 10 (such as the disappearing task bar and non-working Start menu) that they haven't even fixed yet, despite the OS being "rapid rollout". But surely, the future will be better though, eh?

There are plenty of other options out there, from "not upgrading" to "running *nix". The backhanded compliment of "making upgrading EASY" that MS has bestowed upon everyone running 7 or 8.1 makes the fruit even more rotten because over the last year they have made it increasingly more difficult for someone who DOES NOT want the upgrade, to NOT GET the upgrade. Disabling updates completely is not an acceptable solution when the OS is supported for 4 more years with security patches and updates; however, disabling updates completely IS THE ONLY WAY to NOT get the upgrade.

The notion that "you MUST upgrade to not be affected" and the insinuation that "by not upgrading we're not going to patch your OS even though we've promised to do so because there's 4 years left on the clock" is gutter trash.

Ransomware now using disk-level encryption

Re: UEFI

Yes this is ransomware that overwrites the MBR and then the rogue CHKDSK app overwrites the MFT.

UEFI has nothing to do with it; you're thinking of GPT (probably because they somewhat go hand in hand because Windows requires a UEFI enabled motherboard to boot a GPT formatted disk).

GPT is more secure, yes, but it's not bulletproof. Basically all GPT does (from this standpoint) is store several copies of itself across the disk, so if 1 of the GPT's gets corrupted, it has backups to recover from. Obviously though the issue there is if the ransomware gets smart enough and corrupts ALL the GPT records (which will surely be the next phase that ransomware progresses).

Windows 8 and 10 having 'secure boot' capability helps as well but it doesn't really matter if the GPT (or MBR) is hosed because the OS is not going to boot either way.

Mud sticks: Microsoft, Windows 10 and reputational damage

FTFY

Telemetry doubts and question dodging notwithstanding -

"What went wrong? Two things were unusual about this edition of Windows, and each alone could have posed issues for any big software company. One is the fact that the end user has no control over updates and whether or not they install them. Whether you want to or not, you're installing any update for Windows 10 that is released. There is no incubation period, there is no choice. "A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down."

The other, and I believe more damaging, factor was that all this was performed in public. Microsoft decided to push too hard to get people to upgrade, started tricking users into installing updates (and re-flagging updates as "new" to unhide them after users had expressly hidden them out of an unwillingness to install those updates), and this is when the reputational harm was done."

How Microsoft copied malware techniques to make Get Windows 10 the world's PC pest

You forgot to mention KB3123862

You forgot KB3123862 which is the 3rd one to never install.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3123862

"Updated capabilities to upgrade Windows 8.1 and Windows 7"

Thanks but no thanks.

Microsoft's done a terrible job with its Windows 10 nagware

I haven't had any issues or ads since installing that IE security update.

Could be because there are no traces of KB2952664, KB3035584 or KB3123862 on my machines.

Updates are set to Notify only and I have also installed GWX Control Panel and enabled monitoring mode.

Their excuse they keep spitting out about "the #1 question from people is 'how do I get the update?'" is rubbish. They've basically beaten every Windows user over the head with the upgrade offer and anyone who wanted the upgrade has already upgraded.Those who haven't (but do want it) have the GWX icon. Everyone else doesn't want it, and just wants MS to F off already.

Reminder: How to get a grip on your files, data that Windows 10 phones home to Microsoft

"And with Windows I feel people are sounding this warning, pointing, screaming "look! It's horrible what they are doing!" While at the same time using their phones and apps and having no option or concern for what data is being sent back."

The difference is, most of those other companies (Google included) are willing to disclose what they do with the information.

MS has and is still playing coy. Not only that, but let's bring up the giant elephant in the room, which is the Windows Update sneakiness they're trying to pull on anyone with 7 or 8/8.1 into updating to 10....so, trust in MS is in the toilet. They say what they do, but they've already been proven untrustworthy, so why believe what they say? The bigger issue is what they're NOT saying.

Two wrongs don't make a right. You also (most likely) have less personally identifiable information on a mobile device than you do on a personal computer. I couldn't care less if Google wants to crawl my email for a small one line text based ad, but I sure the hell don't want MS cataloging the files on my computer including tax forms with social security numbers. Hands off my computer. Google has access to what I allow them to have access to; MS wants access to everything on my computer. No.

Re: Nothing new

"I think a lot of people seem to forget that Microsoft have been collecting and using telemetry data since at least Windows Vista, this is nothing new here."

Except it was opt-IN and not a requirement of using the OS.

You can also refuse to install the updates that add or modify CEIP and Telemetry in Vista-8.1 as well.

Big difference.

Microsoft herds biz users to Windows 10 by denying support for Win 7 and 8 on new CPUs

Re: So you don't like this?

Their software no longer talks to them unless I allow it.

If I want, I can deny it at the level 2 layer (firewall/NAT) and they won't be able to do a damned thing about it either unless they come to my home and physically access my firewall configuration. (I don't feel the need to do that yet, so I'm relying on layer 7.)

Again - the upgrade will not hit any machines I don't want it to. Very rudimentary network basics in play here. I don't want it, I won't get it. I have enough behind me to completely prevent it from ever happening.

I also don't use their browsers and I block all ads using uBlock Origin so I'm not worried about it there either.

Re: So you don't like this?

"You WILL take Windows 10 if you stay on Windows at all."

Care to bet on that?

-Updates are disabled on all my machines.

-Any 10, telemetry or CEIP updates have not been installed on my machines. I have a script to sanity check this whenever I want.

-I'm also running GWX in Monitor mode.

Windows 10 won't make it to my machines.

I don't give two $#!ts about "after 2020" either, because I'll still be running 7.

If anything, at that point I'll have a 7 host with a Mint guest and I'll use Mint for anything that needs the internet and lock down my 7 host otherwise.

Microsoft’s Get Windows 10 nagware shows signs of sentience

Re: Turn off updates - problem solved.

Sure it does. Patch Tuesday is 1x a month. TeamViewer and Join.me are both free and easy to use. Takes no more than 5 minutes to connect to a machine, hide bad updates, allow good, start the process, and disconnect.

Takes less time than trying to pull WGX or Windows 10 off a machine used by someone who doesn't want it.

Turn off updates - problem solved.

Yes I know it shouldn't be necessary, but at this point it is.

I've turned off updates on all my machines and have had no issues. I manually check for updates every so often and uncheck and hide anything that is known to be suspicious, telemetry or Win10 related.

No issues.

I do also use GWX Control Panel in monitoring mode as a backup but have not had something sneak by (yet).

Any newly imaged 7 machine gets the first several batches of updates through AutoPatcher. After that I rely on WU using a list I've compiled through other sources of known bad updates.

I do have a Lenovo 100S which came with 10 x86 and it's serviceable but only because there are no drivers for 7 to use to put that on here instead.

LogMeIn adds emergency break-in feature to LastPass

So glad I switched to KeePass years ago

Free desktop apps, free mobile apps, synching where I want, security the way I want it.

LogMeIn has great pay products but I fear history will repeat itself with LP Free before too long when they inevitably kill it just like they neutered and then killed LMI Free.

Are you the keymaster? Alternatives in a LogMeIn/LastPass universe

Switched to KeePass over a year ago

Was happy with LastPass but switched to KeePass a year ago once I discovered KeePass2Android on the Play store which would let me use my database on my phones for free (rather than having to pay for LastPass Premium to do so). There are also KeePass add-ons/extensions for Chrome and Firefox (though I just use the keyboard shortcuts and KP's baked-in Auto-Type functionality instead).

LogMeIn is a good company to get bought by, but considering what they did with LogMeIn Free, I wouldn't hold my breath as a LastPass user that the service will indefinitely continue with a Free product. Besides that, I also like the notion of being able to control where my password database is, and the ability to have it be a local-only (and not cloud-based) solution.

Re: Keepass missed a trick

You can export from LastPass into a CSV which can be imported into KeePass.

Obviously the CSV is unencrypted, so - practice safe deletion of that file afterwards. ;)

Mozilla: Five... Four... Three... Two... One... Thunderbirds are – gone

Somebody's already taken the reigns

No real surprise here; Thunderbird fans are better off with FossaMail, just like Firefox fans are better off with PaleMoon now anyways. My my my how Mozilla has fallen.

Why Microsoft yanked its latest Windows 10 update download: It hijacked privacy settings

Lots of "accidentals" for such a large company

That Windows 10 upgrade? It "accidentally" downloads to your computer even if you didn't reserve a copy.

Installing that Windows 10 upgrade? It "accidentally" was checked off to install that update this time.

[a week later]

Next year, that Windows 10 upgrade will not "accidentally" be checked off to install that update.

Your default apps? Those were "accidentally" changed to Microsoft's apps in Windows 10 when you updated the OS.

Your privacy settings? Those were "accidentally" forgotten and reset when you updated the OS.

There's a whole lot of "accidental" mistakes being made by a company that isn't "accidentally" large who doesn't "accidentally" have millions of Insiders doing their beta testing for them.