Watch out for something appearing that will tell you that it is a Skype add-on. I have just spent a considerable time this morning getting rid of 'safeweb' adware and umpteen other bits and pieces it brought in with it. It appears to have circumvented the real Safeweb by apparently looking like both real skype and then adding itself onto Safeweb...
No idea really, except that it came, nearly got me and I had to spend time chasing and killing it and all it brought with it.
If you use Firefox as your web browser it is being updated to version 28 in the next few days. Lots of new features and improvements.
Primarily for those of us with Windoze, a warning about a very convincing message with which I almost got infected.
An attachment to a simple but convincing message from the (UK) Government gateway contains a Trojan. As I write, only 10 out of the 48 anti-virus vendors currently detect this, so please do not open any such attachment unless you are absolutely certain that it's safe, and that you're expecting it.
As a rule, I'm very much against the plague of Virus Warnings, but this one is brand-new and the vendors won't catch up for a day or two, so - Be Careful Out There.
As a follow up post to a previous one this week, here is a link to a free Linux course from no less venerable institutions of learning than MIT and Harvard. This course is normally $2,500 , so get it while it's hot. There is also an info graphic showing the massive demand for Linux people. This is a marvellous opportunity to get into one of the fastest growing job creating parts of IT in the 21st Century. This could be a great way to help people work on-line while living in France.
Nick Huggin ok, and if you take it a step further you come to the real & only Lightroom competitor. Its called digiKam. I work with this opensource since 5 years and works for loyalists and consumer on mickeysoft and OS-X...
Found this great application for stitching together photographs into panoramic views.
You might find it useful too, works with all platforms Linux, Apple OSX andf Microsoft.
@Mike here are a few links I have found for good Windows XP Linux replacements.
You tube video on another XP alternative - Zorin Linux
I don't really think there is any comparison between IBM's genuine move into IT services twenty years ago Nick and the MS attempt to force users from one time charge (OTC) to subscription software. Having been blindsided by the collapse of the obscenely profitable mainframe market IBM did actually start to provide real on the ground services to customers. Traditionally these services were bundled with IBM mainframes (as were IBM operating systems) but as mainframe sales eroded IBM needed new revenue streams. Initially IBM focused on outsourcing (through a subsidiary as IBM itself was precluded from doing so for legal reasons) competing with EDS and subsequently with a full range of services going from top end consulting (ultimately driven by the PWC consulting acquisition) down to smart cabling of new buildings and everything IT related in between those two extremes. This meant that over time the majority of the +/- 300-400K people working at IBM in the early 90s (or should I say those that survived) moved to working on client accounts. In fact many of them joined the company through outsourcing contracts. However, all the fat, dumb and happy bunnies at MS are trying to do is move from an OTC Software revenue model to an annuity revenue model. Still the same crappy software but now you get to pay for it again, and again, and again, and again.............
This is yet more scary revelations from Mr Snowden on what our governments have been getting up to.
Just imagine how it could be used in a country like the Ukraine at the moment,it is very worrying stuff.
More spying on innocent citizens revealed
Keep your firewalls secure - you really do need to.
Brian, I'm currently working with senior Microsoft people on an Azure cloud project, and it didn't surprise me or them. Microsoft is moving to become a services company , just like IBM did before them.
The writing is on the wall for desktop operating systems, as Apple and Google now give them away free, and Linux/Unix has been free for decades - who is going to pay for that? Mobile is the new business, and Microsoft has a very small and unsuccessful part of that. So they either sell services or go backwards as a business. They were never going to keep 98% of the desktop for ever - that is just not economically possible, with three massive competitors now fighting hard for your business in mobile.
You take a phone running Android, and just bring all of Microsofts services up on it, Hotmail,Office 365, Bing, Skype etc. It's a calculated strategy that may have some legs, but as with all these things time will tell.
Internally they openly admit that Windows RT , Windows Phone and Window 8 have been very badly received and unsuccessful, but they don't now see that as their end game. I fully expect to see a lot more Microsoft services on OSX,IOS,Android and Linux. They want my money in one way or another, and being pragmatic is in their DNA.
@Nick That looks interesting, will give it a try. Have several customers who don't want to pay for a Windows 7 licence. I did come across a French Linux distro that loojed exactly like XP once but have forgotten the name.
For those people who are using and are still happy with using Windows XP - here is an article on a way forward using your current hardware to a secure and supported future. It might not be for everyone, but it certainly could help many people move forward.
A secure and supported alternative to Windows XP
Also a recent report suggests that many other users and companies will be joining the migration to a more secure future
11% of XP users could move to Linux in April
Which ever way you turn, do not ignore what is coming in April, you need to take action.
Heh, a hit Vic. Good old capitalism wins again. Remember the old cloth merchant's saying, 'feel the width not the quality'. As good today as whenever that was said.
As has been said before (& attributed to various worthies), if cars had improved many times less than computer hardware, today you could buy a Ferrari for £1 and it would return 1000 mpg!
Brian. It is called capitalism. Don't ask for logic or reasons just feel the soft silkiness of the cheque.
Thanks Peter! It is sad, isn't it!!! Cost us £100,000 new - and now just so much junk! Thanks again - will give it a try!
I'd advertise it on Ebay with no reserve & 'buyer collects'. I'm sure most of these were scrapped, but the gold on the PCBs has some value. Computer museums come to mind, but they're probably overflowing with such stuff.
I did hear the story of a director of Computer Resale Brokers (I think) who threw an IBM 2311 disk drive into the River Hamble to attach a buoy. It was the cheapest scrap metal available!
Any of you retro geeks have any idea what I can do with a complete (I think!!) DEC PDP 11-34 with twin RK07 drives, disks, teletype - I *think* one vt100 terminal and all the original software? Only problem is that it is in the UK and would have to craned off a 1st floor. Hasn't been touched in about 25 years, I think! I really don't want to just dump it in a skip, but I have to find a new home before the end of next month!
OK, giving my age away, I was working on our IBM Phoenix/MVS Mainframe, which we called the mainbrain, from when it went into service in 1973. It saved us a five minute walk to the library to just get a book title for one thing. It was a few years until JANET turned up, she (the Joint Academic Network) was the first email we had, on April Fool's Day 1984 (we thought it was a joke at first). It moved fast from there on it and now it saves flying half way round the world just for a title! Let alone all the rest of it.
Yes peter, the latest versions of Redhat 7/CentOS and Ubuntu server 14.04 will offer a lot of very powerful tools that are fairly easy to master, as they both have GUI tools these days. I think for a beginner, just installing Ubuntu on a PC and learning to use the command line is a great first step.
There is just so much work out there at the moment, every company I go to is crying out for open source people, and they are happy to pay a premium to get them. Programmers in Python and Ruby are charging the earth and agents are fighting over their services. The UK is coming out of recession and needs good IT people quickly.
Microsoft has had it's day in the sun, and has done very well out of it, but in the cloud era it's nowhere, and the skills people want are open source based around Linux.
I would come out of retirement and do remote work for a fraction of the year and earn a tidy sum ;-)
1964 beats me hands down , I started in IT in 1980, programming in Advanced Basic on DEC Mainframes. I'm guessing that was an analogue machine?