* Posts by Martijn Bakker

58 publicly visible posts • joined 14 Nov 2008

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Help. Mailing blacklists...

Martijn Bakker

The problem with "reputation based" lists is that they often use undisclosed and rather fuzzy criteria. And because they monitor behaviour over longer timespans, it tends to take a while before you're automatically delisted.

In addition to everything mentioned above, it helps to look into the DNS configuration for your domain:

- For some email systems, your mail is less likely to be classified as spam if the reverse lookup of your IP (i.e. 8.8.8.8) resolves to somewhere in your domain. Since the mailserver hosts multiple domains, this one is not possible.

- For some email systems, your mail is less likely to be classified as spam if there is an A or MX record for the IP of your server (i.e. 8.8.8.8) in your domain.

- Almost everyone uses SPF. Make sure to add an SPF record to your domain listing the sending server (i.e. 8.8.8.8) as a valid origin for mail from your domain.

All of this will help make legitimate mail from your domain seem more credible.

Obviously, you'd do well to also prevent future abuse. Implementing rate limits, requiring authentication for SMTP connections and limiting sending of emails to just those using email addresses in your domain should help a great deal.

Qmail can't do this (well, I can't do it with qmail and the net is full of people who have tried and failed) and it's not actively maintained.

I would recommend that you look at replacing it with postfix. Not because it's perfect, but it's pretty easy to configure and does support all of the above through a simple configuration options.

Apple: You're a copycat! Samsung: This is really about Google, isn't it?

Martijn Bakker

That is actually a matter of public record. See the investor reports.

Apple's R&D budget in 2008-2012 was about 2-4% of it's revenue. With most major tech companies, this is somewhere around 10-15%.

Also note that this includes ALL product development. So it's not just iPhones and iOS. This includes development on MacOS and it's applications and the development of ll other i<Thing>s.

Since Apple have to develop their hardware, OS and applications themselves (i.e. they can't just buy an OS for their hardware), you'd expect that they'd need to spend more on R&D, not less.

It's likely that they outsource most of their product development.

Mail Migration

Martijn Bakker

Risky business

Okay,

This is a pretty serious project. But we don't know what the goal of the project is. And the people making decisions have no material expertise to base their decisions on. That seems like a bad idea (and business as usual for an IT project, unfortunately).

Since the decision is apparently made without any technical input, there is no need for an analysis of costs.

A bulletproof way of doing it:

- Determine target system requirements (storage, network, backup, load balancing, etc.) based on technical requirements, current usage (storage, backup, bandwidth) and specifics of the intended target email platform (i.e. some systems store mail more compactly than others).

- Acquire target platform hardware and software.

- Install target platform hardware, software, tools for client connectivity, backup etc.

- Set up the new mail platform to send mail via the old mail server

- Test target email platform and client software with a limited number of accounts.

- Test the backup solution for your new system.

- Create a user manual for the new platform and client tools, detailing how to preform basic operations in the new platform (reading and sending mail, scheduling meetings) and some advanced topics (i.e. out of office notifications, sorting mail into subfolders etc.)

- Create a backup of the target system

- Migrate/import/create all mail accounts (but not mailboxes) to the new platform. This may be done with a bulk creation (e.g. from AD) or with a (power)shell script.

- Check that accounts were created correctly. Roll back if not.

- Create a backup of the old system.

- Set up forwarding rules from the old system so mail delivered to the old platform also get delivered to the new platform. Probably with a with a (power)shell script, although some mailservers may accept more generic rules.

- Check that the forwarding rules work. Roll back if not.

- Create a backup of the new system

- Migrate a handfull of mailboxes to test the mailbox migration process

- Check that mailboxes were migrated correctly. Roll back if not.

- Create a backup of the new system

- Migrate all mailboxes

- Check that mailboxes were migrated correctly. Roll back anyway.

- Plan a final migration date, notify users of impending changes and downtime

- Distribute the user manual to all users

- Create a backup of the new system

- Migrate all mailboxes

- Test that mailboxes were migrated correctly. Panic if it didn't work.

- Change MX records to deliver mail directly to new server

- Route mail from new platform directly to destinations

- Change SPF records (if any).

Once you know what your source and destination platform are, people may be able to suggest useful tools to help automate the migration process.

Android users: More of them than fanbois, but they don't use the web

Martijn Bakker

The mobile spending numbers per OS actually make more sense if you assume that the bulk of mobile shopping is done from tablets and not phones. Given Apple's dominance in the tablet area, an iOS bias is only credible.

I find my (Android) phone rather awkward for shopping. The last few times I wanted to order from my phone (theatre tickets), I was forced to switch to the desktop interface because the ticket company's mobile website wasn't accepting orders. I can see myself use a tablet for browsing the online stores, though.

Lawyers: We'll pillory porn pirates who don't pay up

Martijn Bakker

Re: Libel

That could very well be the response they're hoping for. To prove that such a statement was libel, you'd be required to prove that it was defamatory and false. Proving that someone didn't download porn illegally would be even harder than proving that they did (i.e. impossible).

Google wanted Java 'partnership' with Sun

Martijn Bakker
Linux

Re: Do no evil?

Google probably can't "walk away" from Android right away. They will have obligations to handset and tablet makers. Also don't forget that Android makes money for them three ways (Android sales, mobile apps and mobile adds). Even though

Without Google to back it, Android will quickly dwindle and fail. In mobile, every technology is patented at least thrice. Without a powerful player with an extensive patent portfolio to back it, nobody will dare to risk sell anything with Android in- or on it.

Yes, Android would be 'out there'. A handfull of enthousiasts might continue to develop for it. But without new Android hardware, Qualcom and NVidia (who provide most of the chipsets for mobile devices and are notoriously reticent with supplying open source drivers) would have no reason to provide Android driver support.

If Google walk away from Android then it'll be just another quaint and only partly functional "Linux for mobiles" within a year.

That might just be enough to save RIM or even Nokia.

Global chocolate crisis looms

Martijn Bakker
Coat

Re: Well damn, we have to sort this right away!

Professor Guest and the looming global chocolate crisis?

Huhuh, that sounds urgent. More like a comic book title. Go go captain Planet.

A sysadmin in telco hell

Martijn Bakker
Happy

Re: Phew!

These problem are not particular to the US of freephone numbers. My experiences when porting Dutch mobile and landline numbers were much the same.

In my experience, some telcos are more likely than not to mess up a numbers transfer.

Maybe it's a very complicated subject.. or maybe it's the telco's way of getting back at you. Anyway.. the advice is sound.

It never ends: TV exposé tags new Android privacy howler

Martijn Bakker

Re: Not surprised but

- The internet is for porn

- You could install something like AddFree to get rid of adds (not entirely ethical if you use a lot of add supported apps, but it will keep your son from seeing naughty adds)

- The scary bit is that most will assume that you must have done something to make Google think that you have an interest in dating sites

- I generally get adds for games, tech and books. Google must have decide that your genes need to be passed on.

Mobile internet devices to outnumber humans this year

Martijn Bakker
Holmes

Statistics and predictions

An unfounded prediction by a company who stand much to gain if telco's decide to upgrade their infrastructure to adapt to the predicted rise in bandwidth required.

If they were selling pigfood, they'd probably predict a tenfold increase in demand for pork by 2013. That doesn't mean it's going to happen.

All this says is that Cisco would like to stay in business.

Airport bomb Twitter joker in second fine appeal bid

Martijn Bakker

Common sense

a) Has a point. But the credibility of most threats will be highly subjective. Some people might actually believe in the cursing power of Ctulhu mentioned above. Apparently, at least one airport employee was fearful or malicious enough to interpret that tweet as an actual threat. (Then again, in some countries knowingly filing a false criminal complaint could be a criminal act of itself)

b) It's true that, these days, such jokes are an open invitation for people who are supposedly concerned with our "security" to abuse the power we've given them. However, to allow our cynical expectations to dictate an interpretation of law that, even by todays standards, flies in the face of reason en fairness would be a mistake.

Let the law proscribe what should happen. Not what could be expected to happen in some Kafka-esque society where none of us want to live.

Juror jailed for looking up rape defendant on Google

Martijn Bakker
Flame

Contempt of court

This makes me angry.

[rant]

I never was a big fan of jury trials. But do you seriously expect these people to base their decisions solely on the information they are given?

Of course the internet is full of lies. But so are most lawyers and a large number of witnesses. It's not as if you're not trusting your jurors to separate the truth from the lies. Why should jurors be required to base important decisions on a lack of pertinent information?

It seems to me that any court insisting on uninformed jury decisions deserves all the contempt we can muster.

[/rant]

A preview of SOPA: Web shut down before my eyes

Martijn Bakker
Thumb Up

Please support this fine law

By all means, introduce DNS blocking. For all intents and purposes, this will mean that US bases DNS servers become unreliable. This creates opportunities for alternative DNS systems. Soon, we will have not one but many DNS services. A distributed system outside of the control of any one government. This might be a hassle at first, but it will actually make the internet more resilient.

And feel free to hamstring your own businesses. Not only will business be discinclined to base their hosts in the US, they will also be disinclined to use US based banks, payment providers, add companies and other services because of the extra risk this legislation poses to business.

Passing this law is an important step towards a free (if somewhat anarchistic) internet and a major step towards solving the Euro crisis. I'm not sure how it contributes to world peace and the proliferation of unicorns, but I'm sure we can think of a way.

Jimbo Wales ponders Wikipedia blackout

Martijn Bakker
Facepalm

Wikipedia as his weapon of choice

SOPA is a big problem for Wikipedia. They don't have many professional editors. As such, it is impossible for Wikipedia to verify quality and legality of all edits. Currently, editors are (rightly or wrongly) accused of plagiarism on a regular basis.

Under the previous DMCA safe harbor rules, they could be requested to remove an article which some party deemed to infringe on existing copyrights. There would be time to assess the validity of a claim and an opportunity to remove the possibly infringing article without legal consequences to Wikipedia.

Under SOPA, Wikipedia would be liable for mistakes by it's editors even if these happened without Wikipeda's knowledge. Furthermore, SOPA allows for seizure of domain names and possibly other assets without first establishing the merits of an accusation of infringement in a trial. The actions of any one editor could expose Wikipedia to risk of having their domain names and property seized. It would make the existance of Wikipedia in the US nearly impossible.

Impartiality? Really? This law is an direct attack on YouTube, Wikipedia and any other site relying on user generated content. You can't be impartial if you're the one under attack. You're kind of party to the conflict by definition.

Philips Fidelio AS851 speaker

Martijn Bakker

Re: So...this only works...

1. The micro USB is only for charging

2. Most Android devices will detect a change in oriëntation and adjust the UI accordingly, so this will work just as well with devices that have a micro USB on de the side or top. It would seem that you're out of luck if the micro USB is on the back or front of the device.. but that doesn't happen often.

3. From other reviews I get the impression that they fixed the micro USB plug so it can be shifted to the front and back as well as to the left and right at least a little to accomodate different shapes of devices. Nevertheless the author's advice to try before you buys would indeed seem sound.

Mozilla co-founder quits Firefox veep role

Martijn Bakker

Market share and web development

> Any web dev would tell you they've been using Firefox when IE

> had 99% market share.

Indeed. That's because Firefox has a a decent JavaScript debugger and addons like Web developer and because it has always supported a "force reload" that prevents the browser from using cached files. These tools make developing and debugging websites and applications a lot easier. It has had very little to do with market share or quality of the browser.

Whatever your choice of browser, you probably still need to take some time to adapt your sites to IE, Chrome, Safari or Opera (depending on target audience) after.. but that process has become a lot less time intensive these days.

Google's anonymity ban defied by Thomas Jefferson

Martijn Bakker
Headmaster

Free press versus free speech online

There is a fundamental difference between the free speech or free press of the 18th century and our pressent day web 2.0 / social media / tw@tterscape.

Even though the printing press made mass publications cheaper, printing and distributing your ideas still wasn't cheap. Most 18th century commentards published in existing newspapers or periodicals in the form of a letter to the editor. Only a limited number of letters could be published. A letter would have to conform to certain standards (depending on the nature of the periodical) for linguistic correctness, soundness of reasoning and suspected appeal to the periodical's target audience. This forced the authors of such letters to consder their opinions, their target audience and the best way to make their point.

Modern commentards on the other hand, face no such restrictions. Many internet fora allow comments regardless of grammatical or spelling errors (as a non native English writer, I'm sure I've benefited from this more than once), regardless of textual quality and with only a "report abuse" button to weed out the most heinous cases of abuse. They are held to much lower standards for publication. As a result, modern day internet comments aren't nearly as well considered (often reflecting the writer's emotional state at the time of writing) or as well crafted. It's not uncommon even for usually reasonable people to end up in heated flame war of short emotional outbursts.

Given the greater quantity and considerably lower quality of modern day comments, readers pay very little attention to comments. The well considered, more elaborate comments are easily seen as boring and overlooked entirely (I've benefited from this as well). Thus it becomes fairly impossible for someone to influence political opinion through (anonymous) comments. By protecting free speech, we have established a culture where every comment is ignored equally.

Now, I'm not advocating censorship here. I'm just trying to show the limits of the analogy used in the article.

Pedant, obviously

HTC loses prelim patent ruling to Apple, takes stock hit

Martijn Bakker
Devil

@DZ-Jay

Not quite.

If Apple (a latecomer to the smartphone market and a pure sales company with a R&D budget of only about 10% of their operating income in 2009) can win a patent dispute against HTC (a smartphone pioneer with an R&D budget 60% in 2009) for their smartphone patents, then surely one can be forgiven for asking wether the courts might be biased or corrupt.

As for Apple being evil if they loose.. Well, I don't think anyone reading these pages has enough faith left in the US patent system to imply any relation between accurate moral justification and the outcome of a patent dispute. Apple might be evil.. but a patent case is no way to prove that.

Doom guy: tablets, phones to be gaming platforms of the future

Martijn Bakker

Consoles

In fact, I'm sort of hoping for the opposite.

In the 20th century, console games were slower and uglier than PC games and severely limited by their three button controllers. There wasn't a single game on a console that wasn't more fun on a PC .. unless the publisher restricted it to their particular console to prop up failing console sales.

In recent years, processor power has become less of an issue. Even our phones can display a decent 3D image. While this might make phones more attractive as a gaming platform, it also removes much of the gap between PC and console graphics.

Then there's innovation in the controllers. Wiimotes and Kinect allow for lots of new and fun game concepts and remove many of that old awkwardness of controlling your console game with two buttons and a joystick. No longer is the console just a gimped PC.

And there's the development in 3D television. This will allow future consoles to present a genuine 3D experience which we're unlikely to see appear on a PC in the near future if only because few will shell out twice for a large and expensive 3D screen.

Contrary to McCarmac's opnion, it would seem that the console is beter positioned than ever before to become the gaming platform of choice for the near future.

Brit CompSci student faces extradition to US over link site

Martijn Bakker
Happy

Wish I had faith in the government to do the right thing.

Not much chance.

But when your faith in man and the government fails, I urge you to have faith in the stronger forces of stupidity and incompetence.

At least you can count on government do the wrong things inefficiently en ineffectively. Sometimes that's almost as good.

Martijn Bakker
Headmaster

@Captain DaFt

If I recall (from reading extradition laws in the McKinnon and Assange cases, I'm too lazy to read that stuff again), the extradition laws have a number of quite reasonable requirements. This is the reason why Assange needs to be extradited to Sweden for the US to be able to request extradition to their side.

Requirements (among others):

1. The offence for which extradition of a subject is requested should be a crime in both nations

2. The crime must have occured within the jurisdiction of the requesting state, the subject of the extradition request must be a subject of the requesting state or the requesting state must otherwise be the best able to handle prosecution of the offence in question

As to 1: IP offences are usually covered by civil law, not criminal law. Unfortunately, both the US and UK have made both copyright infringement and assisting in copyright infringementent a criminal offence. This is, as you point out, a case of goverments choosing interests of major corporations over the rights of their citizens (although the parallel with actual theft does lend some strength to a counter argument).

However, as to 2., it seems unlikely that a British judge would rule that an American court would be better equipped to handle a prosecution against a British subject who stands accused of having committed a crime under British law on British soil. Agreeing to this extradition request would basically amount to agreeing that all of the internet falls under US jurisdiction. It seems unlikely that a judge posessed of any amount of either sanity or integrity would agree to that.

Then again.. I don't know the British legal system all that well.

TeleWare makes telephony a little more cloudy

Martijn Bakker

@Wize

I don't see that as a technical drawback. You're probably already using landlines, VOIP lines and mobile connections from the PBX for least cost routing anyway. So if one line drops, the PBX will simply route calls via another connection. The calls might be a bit more expensive, but nobody aside from an admin even needs to notice that the landline failed.

There will be some privacy issues, particularly when employees use their business phones for personal calls (as quite a few of us do, because we hate to carry two different mobiles). If you're logging and/or recording all calls, that might be the bigger objection to this.

Germany’s rights-holders hit freetards hard

Martijn Bakker
Boffin

@Cazzo Enorme

Not quite.

At least in my country, the political parties who fail to understand on-line privacy concerns, the cost (in terms of both money and freedom) of wiretapping and disconnection schemes, the whole fair use versus copyright infractions discussions are the same parties who neglect to keep up with all developments in science and technology.

We will often see a strong correlation between failure to understand these issues which only interest a handful of hairy toothed geeks and failure to understand long term viability concerns of alternative energy sources, feasability and desirability of large govermnment IT projects and the necessity for data protection.

The same uninformed politicians also mess up in environmental issues, bringing us government subsidies on undesirable alternative fuel sources (currently wind power and most biofuels). They mess up economically with failed road pricing schemes. They mess up in foreign policy by undersigning one-sided extradition and data exchange treaties.

It's not just an issue for hairy toothed geeks. It's just plain daft to allow people who have not kept up with current developments to dictate your country's plans for the future.

How to choose the right screen size

Martijn Bakker
Happy

Metric screen sizes

Unfortunately even on the continent, where we measure everything else in metres, screen sizes are still measured in inches diagonal.

This has contributed to the idea that while the exact size of a meter might vary according to the temperature, the imperial system varies with politics (and most would rather trust the weather).

When 14" screens for office PC's were outlawed, the same screens reappeared on the market as 15" screens without increasing in size. That's apparently because someone decided that a screen diameter in inches didn't need to specify size of the picture area of the screen.

So now we describe screen sizes in inches and we accept that an inch is generally somewhere between 2 and 2,5 cm.

Child abuse cop slams ICANN

Martijn Bakker
FAIL

Why?

Why do police always seem to think that, when it comes to the internet, others should be doing their evidence gathering for them?

Seriously, I have never heard a policeman complain that burglars don't leave calling cards with accurate address information. Nor have I heard of a requirement that car thieves register their full and accurate contact details with the DMV.

Investigating crimes and gathering evidence are the police's job. If they are incapable, as their insistence that somebody else do it for them seems to imply, then maybe they should be hiring more people with the technical skills that their job requires.

Apple: If you're under 17, you can't use Opera

Martijn Bakker
Thumb Down

Downvoted

For excessive use of exlamation marks and capitalisation, more insults than I usually enjoy accepting from a comedian with an actual sense of humour and enough leet speak to make ones ears bleed.

Too bad. Your point is actually valid and could have been well received (even if pro Apple posts generally are not).

In defence of Comic Sans

Martijn Bakker
Boffin

Might I suggest ...

a minor addition to the domain user's login scripts:

if not exist "%systemroot%\Fonts\comic.TTF" goto end

del "%systemroot%\Fonts\comic.TTF"

regdel "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Fonts\Comic Sans MS (TrueType)"

:end

Lawyer wants WikiLeaker kept off suicide watch

Martijn Bakker
Thumb Up

Someone has

See open letter to the secretary of defense (dated jan 19th) linked below:

http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/006/2011/en

Google axes Jobsian codec in name of 'open'

Martijn Bakker
FAIL

@AC: Fanboi stupidity

You are missing the point.

Flash has been the standard technology for video on the web for the last ten years. HTML5 video creates a possibility for another technology to be the next new standard.

Google's own WebM is supported by Chrome, Opera and Mozilla (something like 50% of actual browser usage, depending on statistics you use). H.264 was supported by IE, Safari and Chrome (something like 62% of actual browser usage). Thus H.264 was in the better position because Google Chrome supported it. Google's own browser support for H.264 was set to undermine Google's efforts on behalf of WebM.

By dropping support for H.264, Google has reduced support for H.264 to about 50%. This gives WebM a fighting chance (and insures that the battle for the HTML5 video standard on the web will rage on for another three years at least).

Regardless of fanboi stupidity, it makes perfect sense for Google not to undermine it's own investment in WebM.

Lawyers fear Assange faces death penalty in US

Martijn Bakker

Treaties

The US-Sweden extradition treaty allows for extradition on suspicion of offences commited outside of the jurisdiction of the requesting nation and in some cases without the customary requirement that the offence for which extradition is requested be a punishable offence in both nations.

http://internationalextraditionblog.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/us-sweden-extradition-supplementary-treaty-35-ust-2501.pdf

http://internationalextraditionblog.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/us-sweden-extradition-treaty-14-ust-1845.pdf

Novell's Microsoft patent sale referred to regulators

Martijn Bakker
Headmaster

@Michael C

Unfortunately, that is not how software patents are used.

In an ideal world, people would be allowed to patent their inventions, on the condition that they share their findings. This provides the inventor with some part of the profits an some measure of control over how their invention is used. In this ideal world, patent applications would be filed by inventors and judged on their technical merits before being granted.

Meanwhile in the real world...

Software patents are granted regardless of prior art, regardless of technical content and regardless of actual merit. If you feel one of your patents apply to any other party's product, you file a court suit for patent infringement. This has resulted in a situation where patent applications are filed by lawyers, automatically granted and their applicability is decided on in (often high profile and prohibitively expensive) law suits.

The legal system being what it is, this means that patent suits tend to get settled out of court, in favour of the claimant with the most money. The patent system has devolved from a method of protecting your inventions (while encouraging the sharing of information) to a legalised means of extortion little different from your ordinary playground bully.

Of course you can patent your own inventions. Good luck defending them against Microsoft, Apple or Oracle in an American court.

When the most notorious playground bullies band together.. is it so unexpected that people will cry wolf?

The pedant icon, since I'm mostly preaching to the choir here

EU telecoms to Apple, Google: 'Pay up!"

Martijn Bakker
FAIL

@Graham Marsden: What would you prefer?

That's just plain wrong

The telco's are discovering that they may have offered those unlimited dataplans a little too cheaply back in the day when winning new customers was their primary concern. We, their customers, pay them for the use of their infrastructure according to contracts and a pricing model established by those same telcos.

The comparison to a road is wrong. Because we the subscribers to their service use the bandwidth, we are your lorries. Not Apple, Google and whomever else may be providing the services.

A closer analogy would be a supermarket selling cans of chicken soup at a discount and attempting to send an additional bill to the poultry farmer because his chickens are too tasty.

Xbox modder can't claim fair use, says judge

Martijn Bakker
Headmaster

@Mike

Indeed it does.

In spite of being written in a confounding bit of legalese, the relevant section of the law begins just like any good firewall definition. "No person shall circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title", followed by a number of exceptions.

I'm guessing the tech companies you mention, could be part of those exceptions... but by that point the analogy to a firewall definition no longer applies and the law devolves into such lengths of legalese and ambiguity as are necessary to insure jobs for members of the legal profession.

Some relevant links and summary may be found here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-circumvention#United_States)

Martijn Bakker
FAIL

Well....

It couldn't "quite" be ROT13. You'd want to be able to maintain that it was a separate and secret mechaniscm (to a courtroom and judge with no clue as to what an encryption algorithm is). But since the DMCA also makes it illegal to spread information which could be used to break a protection mechanism, you COULD make it illegal to explain how ROT13 works (in the US, at least). That's basically what the whole DeCSS case was about.

Again, there is no need for the prosecution to show that you have tampered with someone's (ineffective) protection mechanism, or even that the information you have provided is sufficient for someone to succesfully sabotage a protection mechanism.

The DMCA really is that stupid.

Windows 0day allows malicious code execution

Martijn Bakker

UI

One is led to assume that this is a part of the Windows UI because with Microsoft, NT usually means "Any windows based on the Windows NT/OS2, i.e. any Windows version after W2K", GDI is "Graphics Device Interface" and EUDC is "End User Defined Characters".

Reg Hardware Reader Awards 2010

Martijn Bakker
Pirate

Transdroid

It can't order my oven to start making pizza when I leave work late, but starting downloads of some favourite TV series is almost as nice.

Reg Hardware Reader Awards 2010

Martijn Bakker
Thumb Up

HTC Desire +1

Not because it's like Apple but because it's like the HTC Walabi, only better

Global warming is actually good for rainforests, say boffins

Martijn Bakker
Alien

All that CO2 is good for plants

That would be the Paleocene era wich started with the extinction off the dinosaurs. All that CO2 may be good for our plants, but that doesn't mean it's healthy for larger vertebrates. Not a threat to "life on earth" then.. but probably not good news for us humans either.

Hand over illegal porn at the border, please

Martijn Bakker
Go

No reason to concern yourself, ma'm

* assuming best flying doctors accent *

We're licensed smut inspectors. You ain't got nuttin we ain't seen before.

IE captain flees Microsoft for Google

Martijn Bakker
Boffin

Standards adherence

Don't worry about IE's standards adherence

Every IE version since IE5 has been promised to feature "better support for HTML x", "closer adherence to CSS standard y" and "improved support for Ecmascript z".

This brought us to the point where IE8 needed a separate IE7 compatibility mode.. but had an equally lousy support for actual (x)HTML,CSS etc.

In variation on a venerable, white bearded joke: MS promised they won't violate standards any more (of course they won't violate them any less, either)

Girl, 3, buys iPad apps, using mum's credit card

Martijn Bakker
Gates Halo

Userfriendly

I'm no Apple fanboy, but I'm sure this could be used to argue that anyone can use an iPad.

However, a friend who recently bought a MacBook, held a different opinion:

"I'm a bit disappointed. I'd heard it was real user friendly, so I was hoping it would me more like HP-UX" (wanted to share that.. I thought he was pretty funny)

All a matter of perspective.. and some perspectives are just.. odd.

Police extend detention of e-voting critic

Martijn Bakker
Thumb Up

On the contrary..

Surely, even India knows of the Streisand effect by now?

As a more or less scientific argument by a small pressure group, this would hardly have made the headlines. This wouldn't have gotten half the publicity it deserves if some helpful soul at the justice department hadn't decided to help these people reach a broader audience.

Either this was a brilliant move by a well meaning civil servant.. or a piece of numbskullery of the higest order from a retarded office drone.

Okay.. the odds are against me.. but somehow I want to believe this was a case of the former.

Pupils find teacher's abuse images

Martijn Bakker
Boffin

.. still investigating

Er.. "lowest, calss 1 category"... Collecting for an art project... 4 months out of a maximum of 3 year sentence...

You do realise this probably means they found his manga/anime collection, right?

There's not much to investigate when the auhors names are listed on the font of the book or on the DVD cover.

Wanted: Killer app for Bluetooth SIG (still)

Martijn Bakker
FAIL

Have the SIG considered making existing applications work?

Carkits connecting to the wrong mobile, headsets dropping their connection mid call, wireless mice and keyboards requiring a new pairing (and the use of a wired mouse and keyboard to log in) every time you use your dualboot machine to boot to another OS...

Is there any existing bluetooth technology that can be said to work reliably? Do we realy need another that doesn't?

Brazilian banker's crypto baffles FBI

Martijn Bakker
Pirate

And why is that?

You are right, of course.

And that's probably because most people here have a small truecrypt file somewhere. For dirty little secrets (ours or someone else's), a pr0n collection (if you happen to live in the UK) or just because we can.

We grew up reading cyberpunk novels. Techies are supposed to be able to use encryption software that the suits can't crack. We are ENTITLED.

Confirmation that a good encryption algorithm and a well chosen key can baffle the feds, pleases us. Thieving bankers, on the other hand, are the order of the day. Hardly newsworrthy.

Funny how the mind works.

Android gaining on iPhone among developers

Martijn Bakker
Alert

Security features lacking in Android

The proxy support is a real issue. But I'd say the failing VPN connections, lack of IPSec/OpenVPN support and the absence of any OS support for encrypted file systems are at least as serious.

Also, some people might object to contact details for colleagues, customers and suppliers (most of whom will not have authorised sharing of their contact details and other information with third parties) being synched with Gmail contacts.

I do like my Android phone, but I'll not be using it for work anytime soon.

World's nastiest trojan fools AV software

Martijn Bakker

Scary stuff

A trojan like this, which has been around for over a year, will have many versions. Commercial malware may also come with several capabilities as an option (or custom feature for a specific use/client), changing it's behaviour and patterns.

It's unlikely that "Antivirus Software A can remove Zeus, abut antivirus software B can't".

Microsoft at a loss in Word patent case?

Martijn Bakker

As usual with software patents..

Nobody seems able to report what the patent entails.

Custom XML? Does that mean invalid XML with additional MS features, incompatible with competing products? Or use of valid XML to describe a word processor document?

Is there any chance that the same patent would apply to similar products?

But above all: Who the &*($^ are i4i and what great technological discovery (assuming it's not just using XML to describe arbitrary data, which is what XML is for in the first place) have they been allowed to patent?

US record industry wins $1.92m from file sharer

Martijn Bakker
Go

If this were anywhere else

.. one might be upset that such obviously ludicrous judgements could damage credibility of the nation's judicial system.

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