So I've always wondered at the warranties from say, UPSs or many of the cheapish ($30) surge protectors that supposedly will cover equipment damaged by a surge. I suppose these probably work because they are secondary, so they don't actually do anything in almost all cases (home owners insurance?).
That said, I am interested in what specs would be necessary to actually do something to protect against surges. Do the Tripp-Lite ISOBars work?
I figure that the UPSs that will cut over to battery power if there is a line spike help, but maybe other surge protection (lightning) is impossible for any reasonable cost anyway.
So many variables beyond ABS... So one car had bad brakes... worn pads, bad tires, weighed significantly more, etc etc... Look: Car 1 with ABS and later with ABS disabled - 1993 Olds Cutlass Supreme. Never braked well, takes forever to stop. With or without ABS working Car 2, no ABS - Subaru Impreza 1993 - stopped on a dime in most weather. Car 3, ABS - Subaru Impreza 2007 - stops on a dime in most weather.
I think car design, weight, and the design and state of repair of the brakes is going to make a much bigger difference that ABS.
And your legal counsel isn't worried about you following licensing and EULAs? I have to make sure that the license explicitly allows our use in a research lab / academic environment or get written (e-mail or public forum) releases when it is unclear.
This much better on Windows than it used to be. These days you don't have to worry about applications storing user files and preferences in places like the root directory and C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32, so really all you have to back up is the Documents and Settings folder, which you can think of as/etc and/home and/tmp all rolled into one.
Yea, except for that it shouldn't be/tmp as Roaming Profiles tend to grab that dir, and that it's been renamed in just about every version of Windows, and moved around (I believe in vista it's C:\Users, in Windows NT it was C:\Windows\Personal IIRC)...
And you haven't even started to address the HKLM and HKCU registry directories where most Windows programs store configuration.
Well, there is the port of ezlist or whatever it's called (from ABP) that you can just drop in to a folder for Opera. I suppose occasionally dropping in a file is a bit of a pain, but then again, I use the same proxomitron filterset for months at a time without new ads getting through... I wonder how often you need to update an ad block list now adays...
I see MalwareBytes recommended a bunch, but it *isn't* free. Personal use according to the page from Google: http://www.malwarebytes.org/mbam.php is $24.95 and use in an organization like a school would be some undetermined price - they ask you to contact them for info / sales.
Unless I'm missing something, you couldn't use that in an IT department, or even a helpdesk run by the school without a license.
It would be great for me, though, if I could tell Windows to open a specific file (and saved as copies of that file) in a particular program. I have PDF files I need to open, quite a lot. I generally like to open them in PDF-X-Change Viewer because it supports Tabs and is faster than Adobe Reader in opening a new tab vs a new window, and doesn't seem to get exploited as often.
However, I have one PDF file that contains a form with scripting to do some automated calculations that I have to submit regularly. This only works in Adobe Reader. So THIS one internal form that I trust I need to open, multiple times a week and sometimes multiple times a day, would be nice if it opened in Adobe Reader without the right click, hunt for the open with, hunt for Adobe Reader.
I just tested. In Opera 10 for me, it appears instantly. In older versions there were some painful dialog delays, but for me, they seem to be mostly solved in 10, at least in the dialogs I have used since it's been out in Final.
One of the reasons I still use Opera, even though Firefox is the standard at work, is because I almost never close tabs until I am *done* with them. I don't bookmark things of trivial interest, I keep a tab open - for months at a time. I don't close the browser, even through a restart of the system, I just maintain my session and all the tabs, with state, come back on Opera startup. I usually have 80 tabs open at a time, with close to 40 of those open all the time as work systems such as WebUIs, reference pages, and reference documents.
From Slashdot posts, it's clear there is a market for this sort of browser use. I've even recently remapped my F4 key to open the windows panel and focus quick find so I can find the tab I need. There's clearly work that could be done for large tab sets in all browsers, but Firefox certainly has shown to be less than optimal in my use and in Slashdot posts.
And websites don't want to chance losing business because a potential customer hit their site and it didn't work. Oh, come on - really? Then how come many websites don't work with Opera, or Safari or sometimes even Firefox or Chrome. Oddly enough, the threshold for widespread support seems to be about 20% and IE6 is fast approaching that level. Once it's below that, it'll be as supported as IE5, Opera, etc...
Not that I think it's right, and I'm hoping that with IE6 slowly dying, and the rise of Safari, Crome and Firefox we'll start to see more standards based sites that also happen to work on my browser of choice: Opera. But there are a lot of websites that do not care if 1 in 5 or so cannot use their site, and many many many more who won't care if it's 1 in 20...
And as far as my experiance with Trend Micro, McAffee, and Symantec goes, Comodo's free Internet Security is miles ahead in total security (if you count the HIPS part) and far less of a PITA on the entire system, and less likely to fubar itself. AntiVir, also available free is about equal with Symantec et al in VirusBullitin and VirusTotal testing. So what exactly am I getting on Windows here?
And if you want to talk about joe user compiling code - why not just get the PC hardware, but install Linux? Win-Win... But of course you'll claim that's not a value add there.
And if you think joe user is going to go google how to compile some code, why wouldn't they be able to install WinDVD Personal or whatever comes with the DVD-Rom they bought? Or google and find K-Lite Mega Pak with Media Player classic?
You've got some sort of odd double standard going here. And Macs are getting attacked more recently... Google it.
Maybe I missed your points? I don't see in any way how nationatilization of cell phones fits better than nationalization of health care? And it seems crazy to me to talk about health care without counting the cost it would be to go out and get health care... I mean, employer paid costs are part of the costs that someone who loses their job, or has a job that doesn't offer health care would have to pay...
I would say that you're ignoring the 45 + million people who can say without much repercussion "I don't have a cell phone because I cannot afford it" vs the people who put off going to the doctor where often a $500 preventative treatment would deal with the issue, but they can't afford that so wait till they go to the emergency room, dying or very sick, and cost thousands of dollars, and crowd people who come in with real emergencies like car accident victims etc...
What I really don't understand is why anyone would want to not provide health care to everyone but would think it's a good idea to provide cell phones?
But please elaborate on your points that I'm failing to address.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, as the only recent reports of AV killing Windows that I've seen was a McAffee enterprise update and references in that thread to older Symantec false positives. You DO NOT get what you pay for as far as I can see.
Also, adding value is pretty subjective. How does a code development environment add value to someone who wants to play video games? Sure, it may add value to *someone*, but it may also reduce value to someone else. Here I'm thinking of things like your iDVD - if you want to make your own DVDs, it adds value. But if you're someone like me, who doesn't want to do that, I see it as making the entire product cost more for something I don't want.
Well, no not really. You see, with cellular, you'd have to work to spend $100,000 or some truly crippiling amount. You also can do without for a month or forever if your financial situation changes. Plus, you usually can grab a prepaid plan or a calling card for emergency use and shop around for a practically unlimited time till a deal comes that you like.
Almost none of that is true with healthcare. I mean, sure, if you don't go to the doctor and are healthy, you don't need healthcare at all. But when you need it, often you need it within minutes / hours or days or that's it. You're dead and it doesn't matter. It's not like you can shop around while waiting for the ambulance.
Plus, while not having a monthly plan for a cell phone probably won't end up with you suddenly having a massive cost for *someone* when you need emergency calling, missing preventative health care because you can't afford it incurs massive spending when you do finally end up in the emergency room.
Plus, few people get emotional, somehow due to needing cell phones lose reasoning ability etc, whereas a many who do need health care are in shock, sick, not functioning well etc...
Many Free AV vendors are as good as the pay vendors, see AntiVir, Comodo,etc... And if you're not wedded to visual studio (why?) there are about 10 free development environments ranging from various ports of gc++ to things like Eclipse etc... As posted elsewhere, there's also Visual Stuido Express editions...
Plus, you're talking about stuff that most users aren't going to use - I mean, code development? Web dev? How about watching videos and browsing the web? Many people install software, very few write programs. And McAffee is worse than a virus. Oh, and most OEMs include DVD playing software, either with the PC or with the DVD-ROM if you buy parts...
Well, not true. If you have a firewall rule blocking outgoing traffic except via the proxy server then sure, but if you just have IE via Group Policy using the proxy server, then any browser directly connecting to the internet will bypass that... And it IS what browsers do...
We use OCSNG + GLPI for inventory, though for network monitoring I had decided to go with Zenoss Core over Nagios as I just didn't understand how to set Nagios up. OpenNMS does look interesting though.
GLPI is an invaluable add on to OCSNG IMO. Inventory is somewhat separate from Monitoring IMO - I don't necessarily want to monitor every desktop, but I do want to know where it is... We use Zenoss Core for Monitoring "stuff", and it works quite well once you learn how to configure it. I suppose that's true for everything though.
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So I've always wondered at the warranties from say, UPSs or many of the cheapish ($30) surge protectors that supposedly will cover equipment damaged by a surge. I suppose these probably work because they are secondary, so they don't actually do anything in almost all cases (home owners insurance?).
That said, I am interested in what specs would be necessary to actually do something to protect against surges. Do the Tripp-Lite ISOBars work?
I figure that the UPSs that will cut over to battery power if there is a line spike help, but maybe other surge protection (lightning) is impossible for any reasonable cost anyway.
So many variables beyond ABS... So one car had bad brakes... worn pads, bad tires, weighed significantly more, etc etc... Look:
Car 1 with ABS and later with ABS disabled - 1993 Olds Cutlass Supreme. Never braked well, takes forever to stop. With or without ABS working
Car 2, no ABS - Subaru Impreza 1993 - stopped on a dime in most weather.
Car 3, ABS - Subaru Impreza 2007 - stops on a dime in most weather.
I think car design, weight, and the design and state of repair of the brakes is going to make a much bigger difference that ABS.
LogMeIn on non Windows systems... Just saying, useful java app.
And your legal counsel isn't worried about you following licensing and EULAs? I have to make sure that the license explicitly allows our use in a research lab / academic environment or get written (e-mail or public forum) releases when it is unclear.
Ever tried Opera? It seems like it does what that extension does?
This much better on Windows than it used to be. These days you don't have to worry about applications storing user files and preferences in places like the root directory and C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32, so really all you have to back up is the Documents and Settings folder, which you can think of as /etc and /home and /tmp all rolled into one.
Yea, except for that it shouldn't be /tmp as Roaming Profiles tend to grab that dir, and that it's been renamed in just about every version of Windows, and moved around (I believe in vista it's C:\Users, in Windows NT it was C:\Windows\Personal IIRC)...
And you haven't even started to address the HKLM and HKCU registry directories where most Windows programs store configuration.
Well, there is the port of ezlist or whatever it's called (from ABP) that you can just drop in to a folder for Opera. I suppose occasionally dropping in a file is a bit of a pain, but then again, I use the same proxomitron filterset for months at a time without new ads getting through... I wonder how often you need to update an ad block list now adays...
I see MalwareBytes recommended a bunch, but it *isn't* free. Personal use according to the page from Google:
http://www.malwarebytes.org/mbam.php
is $24.95
and use in an organization like a school would be some undetermined price - they ask you to contact them for info / sales.
Unless I'm missing something, you couldn't use that in an IT department, or even a helpdesk run by the school without a license.
Would it be worth considering one of the compression accelerators available, such as Opera Turbo Mode (if using Opera)?
It would be great for me, though, if I could tell Windows to open a specific file (and saved as copies of that file) in a particular program. I have PDF files I need to open, quite a lot. I generally like to open them in PDF-X-Change Viewer because it supports Tabs and is faster than Adobe Reader in opening a new tab vs a new window, and doesn't seem to get exploited as often.
However, I have one PDF file that contains a form with scripting to do some automated calculations that I have to submit regularly. This only works in Adobe Reader. So THIS one internal form that I trust I need to open, multiple times a week and sometimes multiple times a day, would be nice if it opened in Adobe Reader without the right click, hunt for the open with, hunt for Adobe Reader.
I just tested. In Opera 10 for me, it appears instantly. In older versions there were some painful dialog delays, but for me, they seem to be mostly solved in 10, at least in the dialogs I have used since it's been out in Final.
One of the reasons I still use Opera, even though Firefox is the standard at work, is because I almost never close tabs until I am *done* with them. I don't bookmark things of trivial interest, I keep a tab open - for months at a time. I don't close the browser, even through a restart of the system, I just maintain my session and all the tabs, with state, come back on Opera startup. I usually have 80 tabs open at a time, with close to 40 of those open all the time as work systems such as WebUIs, reference pages, and reference documents.
From Slashdot posts, it's clear there is a market for this sort of browser use. I've even recently remapped my F4 key to open the windows panel and focus quick find so I can find the tab I need. There's clearly work that could be done for large tab sets in all browsers, but Firefox certainly has shown to be less than optimal in my use and in Slashdot posts.
I always thought that someone who said they were a hacker probably wasn't (for either definition) and was instead being pompous.
Just like everything else, the popular are crap...
I'm very surprised, for me there are two choices:
Thinkpad if you want Windows
MacBook if you want OSX
How's the new version of DragonFly going? Can you compare it to Firebug at all?
+1 for OCS Inventory, though we also use GLPI to import the OCS data and let us set location without having to use OCS Agent tags...
And websites don't want to chance losing business because a potential customer hit their site and it didn't work.
Oh, come on - really? Then how come many websites don't work with Opera, or Safari or sometimes even Firefox or Chrome. Oddly enough, the threshold for widespread support seems to be about 20% and IE6 is fast approaching that level. Once it's below that, it'll be as supported as IE5, Opera, etc...
Not that I think it's right, and I'm hoping that with IE6 slowly dying, and the rise of Safari, Crome and Firefox we'll start to see more standards based sites that also happen to work on my browser of choice: Opera. But there are a lot of websites that do not care if 1 in 5 or so cannot use their site, and many many many more who won't care if it's 1 in 20...
And as far as my experiance with Trend Micro, McAffee, and Symantec goes, Comodo's free Internet Security is miles ahead in total security (if you count the HIPS part) and far less of a PITA on the entire system, and less likely to fubar itself. AntiVir, also available free is about equal with Symantec et al in VirusBullitin and VirusTotal testing. So what exactly am I getting on Windows here?
And if you want to talk about joe user compiling code - why not just get the PC hardware, but install Linux? Win-Win... But of course you'll claim that's not a value add there.
And if you think joe user is going to go google how to compile some code, why wouldn't they be able to install WinDVD Personal or whatever comes with the DVD-Rom they bought? Or google and find K-Lite Mega Pak with Media Player classic?
You've got some sort of odd double standard going here. And Macs are getting attacked more recently... Google it.
Maybe I missed your points? I don't see in any way how nationatilization of cell phones fits better than nationalization of health care? And it seems crazy to me to talk about health care without counting the cost it would be to go out and get health care... I mean, employer paid costs are part of the costs that someone who loses their job, or has a job that doesn't offer health care would have to pay...
I would say that you're ignoring the 45 + million people who can say without much repercussion "I don't have a cell phone because I cannot afford it" vs the people who put off going to the doctor where often a $500 preventative treatment would deal with the issue, but they can't afford that so wait till they go to the emergency room, dying or very sick, and cost thousands of dollars, and crowd people who come in with real emergencies like car accident victims etc...
What I really don't understand is why anyone would want to not provide health care to everyone but would think it's a good idea to provide cell phones?
But please elaborate on your points that I'm failing to address.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, as the only recent reports of AV killing Windows that I've seen was a McAffee enterprise update and references in that thread to older Symantec false positives. You DO NOT get what you pay for as far as I can see.
Also, adding value is pretty subjective. How does a code development environment add value to someone who wants to play video games? Sure, it may add value to *someone*, but it may also reduce value to someone else. Here I'm thinking of things like your iDVD - if you want to make your own DVDs, it adds value. But if you're someone like me, who doesn't want to do that, I see it as making the entire product cost more for something I don't want.
Well, no not really. You see, with cellular, you'd have to work to spend $100,000 or some truly crippiling amount. You also can do without for a month or forever if your financial situation changes. Plus, you usually can grab a prepaid plan or a calling card for emergency use and shop around for a practically unlimited time till a deal comes that you like.
Almost none of that is true with healthcare. I mean, sure, if you don't go to the doctor and are healthy, you don't need healthcare at all. But when you need it, often you need it within minutes / hours or days or that's it. You're dead and it doesn't matter. It's not like you can shop around while waiting for the ambulance.
Plus, while not having a monthly plan for a cell phone probably won't end up with you suddenly having a massive cost for *someone* when you need emergency calling, missing preventative health care because you can't afford it incurs massive spending when you do finally end up in the emergency room.
Plus, few people get emotional, somehow due to needing cell phones lose reasoning ability etc, whereas a many who do need health care are in shock, sick, not functioning well etc...
So I disagree totally...
Many Free AV vendors are as good as the pay vendors, see AntiVir, Comodo,etc... And if you're not wedded to visual studio (why?) there are about 10 free development environments ranging from various ports of gc++ to things like Eclipse etc... As posted elsewhere, there's also Visual Stuido Express editions...
Plus, you're talking about stuff that most users aren't going to use - I mean, code development? Web dev? How about watching videos and browsing the web? Many people install software, very few write programs. And McAffee is worse than a virus. Oh, and most OEMs include DVD playing software, either with the PC or with the DVD-ROM if you buy parts...
Well, not true. If you have a firewall rule blocking outgoing traffic except via the proxy server then sure, but if you just have IE via Group Policy using the proxy server, then any browser directly connecting to the internet will bypass that... And it IS what browsers do...
We use OCSNG + GLPI for inventory, though for network monitoring I had decided to go with Zenoss Core over Nagios as I just didn't understand how to set Nagios up. OpenNMS does look interesting though.
GLPI is an invaluable add on to OCSNG IMO. Inventory is somewhat separate from Monitoring IMO - I don't necessarily want to monitor every desktop, but I do want to know where it is... We use Zenoss Core for Monitoring "stuff", and it works quite well once you learn how to configure it. I suppose that's true for everything though.