* Posts by DutchP

45 publicly visible posts • joined 4 Nov 2009

Canadian operator EasyDNS stands firm against London cops

DutchP

just out of curiosity

How is it that there is such a thing as "intellectual property crime" in the first place? Isn't this - by definition - more of an economic dispute between two parties and should hence be covered by civil law?

Sounds like the judicial systems are being abused to do the corporations' dirty work here.

Yeah, now's the time to get cynical and all, but, seriously, how have we let this happen?

Expert chat: The end of Windows XP and IE6

DutchP
Trollface

A *lot* has been written that's better than XP, just not by Microsoft

Windows NT: Remember Microsoft's almost perfect 20-year-old?

DutchP

Re: "everyone bets on Linux today"

Outlook is only part of it, you'd need an exchange-like back-end as well to offer proper calendaring and such. There are a few groupware solutions for Linux. As it happens, I do some volunteer work for Kolab in my spare time. Check it out on www.kolab.org. At the very least it proves you can do this on Linux, but the Outlook/Exchange platform is very deeply entrenched in business, so it'll be Windows for a while yet.

Nokia Lumia 925: The best Windows Phone yet

DutchP

Re: Maybe, maybe not.

Right...and using an article about some phone to tell everybody how much you hate Eadon is something else entirely of course, eh?

Canonical unveils fondleslab-friendly Ubuntu 'experience'

DutchP

I had an old tablet lying around that I never managed to properly get to work with Linux. Recently I gave it another shot with Ubuntu (12.04, if memory serves) and what do you know? It worked like I've never seen it work. So your Wacom may as well. No guarantees, YMMV, and all that, but definitely worth having another look at.

Office 2013 now available for some home users

DutchP

desktop personal productivity software

a misnomer if ever there was one

Only partly joking here. Word is an application that I spend a large part of my workday in, and no other program has ever caused so much loss of work and productivity as this one. Crashes, hangups, stuff that didn't get saved and corrupted files. Without it, the world would be a better place. Or mine, at least.

I'll take libre office any day of the week.

Schmidt 'very proud' of Google's tiny tax bill: 'It's called capitalism'

DutchP

Re: Piro

Downvoted because it simply isn't true, as 5 seconds of duckduckgo-ing shows.

Now there's a proper DDG downside, it's not a very pleasant verb

Google's UK grip slips a bit, brutal dominance basically unshaken

DutchP

My primary search engine these days is duckduckgo.com.

Occasionally I can find what I'm looking for (mostly obscure errors from my Gentoo box) and I try my luck at startpage.com.

Haven't really used Google in quite some time.

Reds in the Routers is routine, not rare

DutchP

Right...

"In essence, these Committees provide a shadow source of power and influence directing, even in subtle ways, the direction and movement of economic resources in China."

And the US have none of those, naturally

Navy devs cook up Android spyware to map your location - in 3D

DutchP
FAIL

Very annoying

Not being spied upon, obviously, that happens all the time, we're used to that, and anyway if you have nothing to hide...., privacy is obsolete anyway, this is the 21st century, insert your mantra of choice here.

But..

1. it mutes the volume every time it takes a snap

2. answering a call is supposed to give it a decent sweep of the room

So if I talk to someone with an infected phone, I'll be constantly repeating myself because the volume gets muted on the other end.

They're really gonna have to do better than that.

Politico's locked room mystery Linux install crime solved

DutchP
Linux

It's a kind of magic

"a campaign staffer wiped the hard drives accidentally after mistakenly inserting a Linux system disc into a Windows machine"

I reckon he/she would also have had to provide some really dumb answers to some fairly obvious questions for this to happen.

Or maybe Steve-O was right after all and Linux is indeed a cancer.

<- Autorun penguin

Linux-based Tizen mobile platform lives!

DutchP

Re: Hmmm...

ok, now i see my number 5 is your no. 2.

Well, hmmm indeed

DutchP

Re: Hmmm...

Add to that

5. A profound wish to stay out of the clutches of Google

This is what's keeping me from using Android. Of course you can root it and use a different mod, which I wouldn't mind in itself but these mods generally only exist for high end phones. I don't want to spend that much.

So, if this leads to a decent mid-range phone, I'd be very interested indeed.

New vicious UEFI bootkit vuln found for Windows 8

DutchP
Coat

Obviously this is on purpose

so SecureBoot must be enabled and it becomes that much harder to run Linux.

<- mine's the one with the conspiracy theory in the inside pocket

Report: Microsoft to cop it from Brussels in Browser Choice affair

DutchP

Re: MS and not Apple......

Well, you kinda do, which IMHO is a bigger problem than whatever browser comes pre-installed.

Try buying a non-windows PC, you'll soon find yourself shopping for components, which is not everyone's cup of tea. And let's not get started on laptops....

Google snags patent on price discrimination

DutchP
Joke

Re: That is why we use a clean browser for purchases

Can't have that sort of behaviour, now can we? There has to be a patent to detect this and charge you extra for it.

Obviously you have a right to to this kind of independent, think-for-yourself, anti-social deviant behaviour but it's gonna cost you

Disney sitcom says open source is insecure

DutchP

Re: money

let's hope you're right, notwithstanding the abysmal spelling

DutchP

or better yet, just don't

DutchP

Re: Payback?

"it often feels that Microsoft views Big Media as their client rather than the sap paying for their software"

Because that's exactly how it is. Big media and other "partners" in their "ecosystem" are the clients. The poor sap doesn't even pay for the software, he pays for the license to use it, and to get shafted every step of the way. The sap is the target, or the mark, or whatever you'd like to call him other than client or customer.

Well, that gets the Monday morning rant taken care of, back to work now

Raspberry Pi now comes in Firefox OS flavour

DutchP

all right then

Seeing as how it's Friday anyway...

Firefox OS: easy as pi

Firefox OS has its pi and eats it too

Firefox OS gets slice of the pi

This reminds me, I have an uneaten pi at home that I still need to figure out what to do with. Hope it hasn't gone stale yet. Might still be fine with a cup of tea from a rotating teapot, though

Windows 8: Download it, then speak YOUR brains

DutchP

just give it some time, I'm sure Redmond will fix that awfull snappiness eventually, just like they managed with every other windows version so far

DutchP
Thumb Down

Seriously?

I don't know of anybody eagerly awaiting this....Win 8.

Even my son, who is a total Windows fan will give it a miss because he thinks it's unnecessary, irrelevant and pig-ugly.

I'll spare you my own, rather prejudiced (having switched to Linux a few years back) opinions.

But I do wonder where on earth this "Eagerly awaited" comes from...

Study: Climate was hotter in Roman, medieval times than now

DutchP

Re: That graph

My thoughts exactly, I knew this reminded me of something...

http://www.xkcd.com/833/

There, obligatory xkcd reference covered as well.

Free tool inspects all your personal 'ware automatically

DutchP

Re: Close, but no cigar

I mean that Windows doesn't do this out of the box, so now you depend on another external tool to manage all the different software.

In penguin land you can just update everything very easily with a few mouse clicks, or one or two commands, if you prefer. This comes out of the box.

So, while this is absolutely a nice tool for the windows world, it's a shame really that the OS doesn't handle this any better. At home, I spend more time keeping a single Windows XP machine up-to-date than I do updating 4 linux boxes. And this is caused not by Windows update, but downloading and updating all the individual software.

There's a lot of stuff you can comment on in Linux, but this an is area where Windows is way behind.

So, nice tool and all, but it really shouldn't be necessary in the first place.

DutchP
Linux

Close, but no cigar

Nice try, but a far cry from a proper software repository that does everything for all software.

Nokia shares fall as it drops first quarter forecast

DutchP

Translation

"competitive industry dynamics" and "gross margin declines, particularly in the smart devices business unit"

means

"nobody wants our Windows phones even if we practically give them away"

Way to get off your 'burning platform'

Amount of ice in Bering Sea reaches all-time record

DutchP

The discussion is beside the point

Alarmist environmentalist warnings/doomsday prophecies aren't doing any of us any good. In fact, their being proved wrong will just cause people to carry on as they were and forget about the whole 'environment thing' (cry wolf, anyone?).

On the other hand, sticking your head in the sand and ignoring everything isn't particularly helpful either.

And let's not get started on just obliterating anything and everything in your path to make the extra buck, errrr, sorry, make that increase shareholder value. Does anyone still believe that greed is good?

So where does all this leave us? You really don't need scientific proof to act in a fair, civilised and responsible way, and to have a little bit of solidarity between different parts of the world and between generations.

Actually, it's remarkably easy:

- Try not to buy stuff that has travelled halfway across the earth

- Eat locally produced food as much as possible

- Conserve energy on general principle; just don't waste it, is all

- Clean up after yourself

- Don't make the other parts of the world pay for your lifestyle

- Don't make future generations pay for your lifestyle: making a mess now and have your kids clean it up just isn't very nice

- Cheap flights ARE too good to be true

- ...

I'm sure that in any given situation anybody with half a mind can figure out what is the, or at least a, right way to act. Spotting what is most clearly wrong is even easier.

Everything has a price, and somebody somewhere is (or will be) paying it. The question is who, and is that right? The answers are there, but of course you have to want to know them.

Munich's mayor claims €4m savings from Linux switch

DutchP

Nattily dressed?

As in Natty Narwhal? Looks more like a walrus to me.

Joking aside, this is pretty good news. If you ask me, Holland mindlessly hands over way too much money to a certain redmondian firm whose name shall not be mentioned.

Microsoft probes IE8 dll AWOL hell

DutchP

Hmmmm....not being able to boot IE8

Just....how is this a problem?

Google flings Bing into search engine bin

DutchP

I wouldn't know

Never tried Bing, not likely to either.

I agree with earlier posts that Google needs some competition, but that doesn't have to mean Bing.

What we need are privacy-respecting search engines such as ixquick, startpage.com (powered by ixquick) and duckduckgo.com to get a larger audience.

Unfortunately, most folks don't seem to give a rat's ass about their privacy.

I try to avoid using google as much as possible.

Adobe: crashing 100 million machines not an option

DutchP
Linux

Unfortunately it's still a bridge too far to dump flash yet, but I've said goodbye to reader years ago. Both Windows and Linux have excellent alternatives, that don't have all the bloat, plugins and attack surface.

If ever there was a piece of unneccesary bloatware it has to be Adobe Reader.

Penguin, because it never blue-screens me. Ever.

Windows 8 secure boot would 'exclude' Linux

DutchP

it's the exact opposite

make all hardware not run anything other than your software

Microsoft milks Casio for using Linux

DutchP

Wiseguys

"nice store you got there. What a shame if it'd burn down"

Now where's that A-team when you need them?

Unlikely contender tops rankings in Nokia ringtone quest

DutchP
Joke

Sounds like

something that's dead already but doesn't know it yet.

Oh, hang on....

How are we going to search our hard disks now?

DutchP
Coat

KDE - Nepomuk/strigi, anyone?

Ok, so I'm feeling brave today.

I know it really sucked in earlier KDE 4.x versions, but ever since 4.6 (i think) it doesn't eat too many resources anymore, doesn't get in the way, searches tags, names, file content and what have you. And it's nicely integrated with dolphin, too.

For example, you can tag your photo's in digikam, but you can use the same tags for other stuff as well. So you can connect whatever you like, in whichever way you like, and you'll even be able to find it later.

Mine's the fireproof coat. Or at least I seriously hope so

Facebook deletes hacked Pages, destroying years of work

DutchP
Linux

This is not a title

Amazing how many people still believe that somehow facebook exists for their benefit, or that their benefit even matters one little bit to facebook.

The penguin, 'cos I like to be in control myself

HP breakthrough to hasten flash memory's demise?

DutchP

with all the quantum mechanics involved...

i suppose that would be schroedinger's cat, then

Mozilla debuts Firefox 4 for Android

DutchP

Posted from my N900 - FF 4

but I had to go here:

http://moff.mozilla.com/latest/maemo/multi/dists/fremantle/release/binary-armel/

and install the .deb directly. Somthing's definitely wrong with all the automatic redirection that happens if you follow the official link

Prepping the great Windows 7 migration

DutchP
Linux

Different decision

Deciding to move to Windows 7 is the easy bit.

no....

Deciding whether or not to move to Windows 7 is the easy bit. Take a wild guess at the answer

Prisoners plot strike action over mobile phones

DutchP

A fan, surely

of The Office US, this "Prison Mike"

MS drops drive pooling from Windows Home Server

DutchP
Pint

Well then,

just set up a Linux box and use LVM. Then go do something fun with the money you're saving

Beer, because after you've set up LVM you have most certainly deserved one

Linux life savers for paranoid penguins

DutchP
Linux

If it has to alliterate

I'd go for prudent, not paranoid.

That's not to say there isn't plenty of other stuff to be paranoid about :-).

FWIW my weapon of choice is Bacula...it comes in the night and sucks the essence out of your pc. Slightly geeky, but once you have it running you don't have to worry about anything. Especially the bootstrap file is really powerful in case things ever completely break down. And we all know they will at some point, don't we? Hmmm, maybe paranoid after all.

Penguin, because...what else?

Microsoft douses VMware with cold cloud shower

DutchP
WTF?

Hilarious

Microsoft warning about vendor lock-in.

What they mean is probably that their lock-in is way better than VMWare's

Apple denies iPhone 4 antenna glitch, blames inaccurate signal bars

DutchP

Too many bars

is probably what the apple guy thought as well, after he lost the much discussed prototype in the last one

Early adopters bloodied by Ubuntu's Karmic Koala

DutchP
Thumb Up

Some issues and some RTFM

Over the weekend I upgraded 3 PC's to Kubuntu 9.10. Yes, all right, I upgraded, next time I'll do the fresh install instead. I guess I came out lucky not to have inflicted any too serious injuries on myself.

Anyway, two upgrades were absolutely flawless. The third gave me some trouble.

The upgrade stopped right after the initial download with an error about package dependencies between mythtv and mysql. I finally managed to resolve that using aptitude. I proceeded the rest of the upgrade from the CLI as well. Not nice, but I got it to work in the end.

Mythtv stopped working. I should have read the release notes. It was an easy fix after I found out what to do.

My system was bogged down with nepomuk using 100% cpu. After I made a fix, which took me a few minutes of googling to find, the thing worked. And I must say, I do like the desktop search possibillities this offers. It's even more promising for the future.

I also had some issues with akonadi, which I need because all my contacts and appointments are in a kolab server. As of this realease kontact depends on akonadi to access those. I got that sorted as well, but this really should have worked out of the box

It was however a good learning experience, because in previous releases I took the easy way out and disabled akonadi, nepomuk and strigi. This time around, I had no such option.

In summary, I had some dark moments, but the light is shining ever so brightly now :-). I agree with everyone who likes the KK release, but in all honesty the ride to get there could have been a bit smoother.

As to the canonical discussion. Maybe they might contribute more, but they are a great enabler for a relatively painless transition from windows to linux, and they get every credit for that. And ubuntuforums is a great community.