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1
Living Room / Re: Recommend some music videos to me!
« on: December 26, 2018, 09:30 AM »
I didn't search those 56 previous pages for it, so please forgive me if this is a clone, but Lisa Stansfield at Ronnie Scott's 2002 (available on YT: https://www.youtube..../watch?v=PhWc50digwI - bear in mind that the genial composer of most of her stuff is her husband, Ian Dewaney: the most successful and beautiful marriage of all time: the ideal one, I think) is the very best music video as far as I'm concerned, for the last 30 years (i.e. not considering Pink Floyd at Pompei and, well, Al Jarreau, that FRIDAY evening in March, 1976; the available video being from the following SATURDAY anyway (yes, within less than 24 hours, they carried on their broadcast vans, it was THAT good), and I had been there Friday evening, so I can compare, and nothing, NOTHING compares to that Friday evening, at "Uncle Pö's", Hamburg, March 12, 1976). That being said, Tash Sultana's "Jungle", e.g. here: https://www.youtube..../watch?v=Vn8phH0k5HI , and that girl in general, are something quite special I might say. And then, there'll be always the very best rendition of Donny Hathaway's "Some Day We'll All Be Free", Alicia Keys's, from the 9/11 telethon (9/21/2001): https://www.youtube..../watch?v=p8l2OO6xxIc

2
(to my knowledge)


You'll remember some OneNote discussions, people complaining about the stall of the desktop version (which remains available, for the time being).

There's a general risk that any software developer out there might rise their update prices, at any given time, tenfold; the same is true with them switching to a cloud and/or subscription model, and the real risk here - it was me who mentioned this some months ago on the outlinersoftware forum (or additionally even here, I don't remember); nobody else seems to care, or then feared in private - is that the function of the software in question could cease, by real technical reasons or just since the developer will have decided so, with any (minor or more probably) major Windows 10 update.

As for going from desktop to cloud, a blatant example is Correlate, the ONLY (then) really smart (available) file management system, (then and) now correlate.com, and, the fact which is utmost appalling: They don't give awy ANY info anymore if you don't "sign up with your corporate [or MS or similarly pre-checked, "genuine"] mail address".

At the time (version 6.6, in 2013, for example), it was 149$ plus VAT, i.e. near 200 euro for continuously-buggered European Union customers, and now, can't even know; I don't know either if people who had bought in time, have been able to continue their software beyond them "going cloud" or not, but whatever: They could "kill" their defunct desktop application anytime, or then MS (by pure technical means) could do it for them, again anytime.

Since we're speaking of "serious users" here - who else would buy a file manager at 200 bucks? -, this situation seems to be inadmissible to me.

It goes without saying that users could only fall into such a possible trap whenever the tool in question either changes your data format or then does add real added value to your data, in form of invaluable but scarcely exportable meta-data (as Correlate does; well, I don't know anything of the latter's exportability there).

(To give a counter-example: If you edit your video with one tool, and then there's something in their policy you're really unhappy with, you continue your cutting work, on this movie or with any other coming along, with any other editing tool on the market.)

What do people / prospects speak about indeed, it's the fallacy - "fact" for them - that you should not confide your data to some "little developers" - "who knows if they still will be in business next year?"; at the same time, even the biggest software developers in the world simply just kill their software ad libitum (ie just as it pleases them); examples abound, for that last 30 years or so.

Thus, it becomes obvious that the risk does not lie in your developer's being a 1-man shop or some multi-national conglomerate (which will certainly outlive the particular software they will have sold you, but that'll be no consolation for you), but in the fact that whenever you accept to comply with some dedicated file format, or some very special meta-data management, even if that will rise your productivity to some unheard-before level, you'll be

- at the mercy of the respective developer re possible price increases ("backed-up" by automatic W10 updates killing what you've got before), or

- overhaul of other factors (the tool going desktop > cloud or any other nuisance you are not going to accept), and that's not even speaking of

- stealing your data (which is even possible for desktop applications, but more probable for cloud "solutions").

Hence, what to do? I think that every such application which treats your data in a way that it'll be NOT possible to switch to any competitor, hassle-free and without losing (core or meta) data, should provide, up-front, transition tools (and which you could try up-front, too, i.e. onto some sample data) in order for you to verify that if there is any problem with that tool, you'll be free to leave, in some way or some other.

Of course, if that tool is spectacularly superior to its competition, that will be difficult to achieve, but at least technically, there should be some chance for doing so, and/or for competitors to "overtake" then, without too much trouble.

Some weeks ago, I said, in the outlinersoftware forum, upon the question "Exporting Ultra Recall database (any experiences, pls?)",

"Hint: UR doesn’t have a principal parent, and then secondary parents, but then, the respective table mentions them in a given, chronological order (of time of creation of the parentage, which for the very first parent is identical to the time of creation of the item), so the first occurrence there could be treated as the parentage, further occurrences as links, even in tools without cloning (like RightNote)." - which was a little bit simplified, of course (the outlinersoftware forum not being a technical one, far from it), since

- not in all cases, the very first occurrence of some info item will be it's "natural" one; sometimes, it'll be some (later-created) "clone" which really will be the "core" occurrence (among other examples, you first write down some "ToDo", then only create the "real", "original" subject within its ontology)

- I (on purpose) didn't address the fact over there that such "original" items then could have become renamed and, in particular, moved within their tree in-between (but these are just minor, technical, "problems"; the necessary data, for analyzing all this correctly, in that case, will be all there).

Whatever: My point being: Especially the "exotic" data formats, or (meta-) data re-arrangements, should be perfectly "open", and then, it wouldn't matter that much if you confide your data to some - reliable - "lesser" developer, in view of the fact that the "big shots" don't treat you any better in the end:

- You should be confident that your data isn't at risk (in both respects: you not losing your data, and any third-party not getting access to it), and

- You should be confident that for your data, there will be some manageable way out.

If I have left out valid considerations / aspects, please add them.

3
General Software Discussion / Re: Et Tu, CCleaner!
« on: December 26, 2018, 08:12 AM »
4wd: "Wouldn't it be a lot less complicated, (and cheaper), to have the browser delete cookies when it's closed, (ie. they all become session cookies) ?"

Hence my question above; unfortunately, the traditional FF add-in having brilliantly done exactly that not working anymore beyond FF 56 (or whatever the exact version number was).

4
Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Directory Opus 12 - 40% discount
« on: December 26, 2018, 08:07 AM »
1)

To echo Tuxman: "Even FreeCommander (as implied, more or less free) does that." (admittedly to a lesser degree; and of course, most paid file managers do it, too.)

"I think that the main advantage of DO over other file managers is the ease with which it enables one to label files with different colors and statuses, and to sort and organize the files accordingly."

Let's put this straight. Many people who love their current software but don't know too much about competing software, make similar errors, in part by their lack of knowledge, but in part, oh yeah, in a try to endorse their investment.

For example, I, some time ago, had made the mistake to buy the then most expensive duplicate tool, then only discovered  - the trial is a crippled one - how bad it was, after all; the almost-universal prejudice / false preconception that "you get what you pay for" worked in BOTH ways : I should have known better, even then, from life-long experience. (I relate on that duplicate tool error of mine in the Trial thread, and I lately even discovered that now that most expensive tool has become free (!), and at that "price", it isn't that bad at all, finally...)

Now, to DO, both phenomenons apply:

- with the (non-competitive) price come some quite positive expectations: it should be superior (which it is not, but it's not inferior either to its best competitors)

- since you (the paying user) payed the price, you then would not really like to discover that you could get that same functionality (which is important to you) for much less, so you don't really want to get fully informed on that comparative situation; that's human, that's not lying, that's simply denying; and, of course, that doesn't apply to any such statement along those lines; some people just don't know better and speak too early: that's human, too, I speak here from my personal experience. (And yes, of course, "Everything" is the best tool there is on the market, for any Windows user of all ages, and by far.)

Fact is, a tool like DO profits from this lack of knowledge of some of its users and who then "spread the word", DO allegedly being superior.

As said by me above, I cannot speak for the strengths of the preview pane, never using that in any of my file managers, BUT since there is an allegation that DO was very strong in this field, I speculate (!) that for modern file formats, XY is on par with DO, most of DO's additional file formats being defunct for ages now, e.g. some text processors from the Nineties, and so on; also, for most of the available formats in DO, you need to buy some third-party add-in, at 30 bucks plus VAT if I remember well. Also, exotic but current file formats are more or less absent from that additional list, too, whilst, again, you get lots of defunct file formats, and, let's be honest here: That's not because of the real interest in these formats, but because they (the third-party entity) simply have more or less stopped development in that area 2 decennials ago.

2)

Since we mentioned SpeedCommander above: The "speciality" of SC is that is has NO English-speaking forum BUT a German-speaking forum, and - I missed mentioning this important fact above - even the help is in German, but NOT in English, too, so they specialize in German customers with no or unsufficient knowledge of English, but non-DACH (D, Austria, Switzerland) customers should be very rare. This particularity explains both the exaggerated pricing of this tool, and the fact that on most counts, it's inferior to some of its competitors; for example, its meta data management is abysmally bad. On the other hand, it has always been, and by far, the prettiest file manager there is, and copying their (minimalistic but utterly pleasant) screen design should not be too complicated... but would go against their competitors' respective egos.

Btw, many Italians, Russians, Chinese, French, Spanish (-speaking people) are awaiting your special file manager development, including full service in their respective mother language...

And again btw, DO's management of tagging and/or "virtual folders" / whatever-you-call-it is NOT superior to its best (paid) competitors either; it just seems to be at first look.

3)

Whenever I speak of pricing / prices here, I always take into account the fact that FC is more or less free, and that both X2 and XY are both available with a so-called "lifetime" license, where the price includes any updates, and that this even applies to their regularly getting back to bitsdujour, and thus, when I say that over a user's lifetime, DO might be at a price tenfold its competitors, that's estimated on this basis.

5
Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Directory Opus 12 - 40% discount
« on: December 23, 2018, 03:36 PM »
I'm not against DO (anymore so much), my argument here has exclusively been that from my observation (which has been repeated but not systematic), it seems they (almost?) exclusively have been offering sales when the life time of the current major version is coming to its end, but when the term in which you are entitled to get the next major version for free has not yet begun.

I've come back here in order to see if my remark has motivated DO to tell me wrong in this instance, but obviously that is not the case, and I don't like at all their smart-ass attitude which becomes evident here again: they really suppose prospects, even here, can NOT do their maths.

Btw, whenever I get to the limits of x2 (for pics, I use FastStone Image Viewer, but in case, XY would be excellent for pics, too, whilst x2 is very bad for pics indeed, but I'm not speaking of pics, speaking of x2's limits here anyway), I then go to DO's online manual and check if possibly DO can do what I want (possibly with a little scripting), and so far, every time, DO doesn't do it either, so up to now, I never saw a reason for me to buy.

And to give an example, DO's metadata management is lesser than x2's. Also, when you contact DO on such things in their forum, you just get a shrug instead of a "thank you for this idea we'll implement asap".

Thus, for the time being, DO takes advantage of its better looks and ergonomics, compared to x2, and its better technology and ergonomics compared to XY (which is very bad on both counts, but quite pleasant on first sight), and it also seems preferable for users who like to view / "preview" lots of their files within their file manager, pdf's (or pics) for example, which I don't ever do (or long for), and that also invalidates some common advantages of XY (and DO) over x2 for me.

Thus, I'm constantly tempted by DO because, I, too, am sensitive to flock consensus, but whenever I try to find a reason to buy (and then to use), I don't find any, and, as implied above, that's largely due to the elusiveness of the new developer, which is on par with the one shown by the 2 creators of DO which seem to not work on the code anymore, their ancient forum guy (Leo) now seemingly doing all the work alone.

I stay receptive, but creativity and openness are part of the game, not just coding, especially if you if over a lifetime (of the user), your price is tenfold or more the one of your competition, so I suppose they will not get too many new customers, XY and X2's "lifetime" licenses certainly biting deep into DO's numbers, and then their additional-payments (which aren't wort it in the end, I firmly suppose) policy will certainly back off quite some prospects.

(I can't speak of the respective strengths and weaknesses / misses of the contenders in web storage accessibility / management ; for users who use web storage (which I do not), this should be a core aspect indeed. I just know that the "prof" version of SpeedCommander (which does not have an English forum) comes with a very impressive list of such web storages it can handle; otherwise it's quite inferior.)

6
Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Directory Opus 12 - 40% discount
« on: December 22, 2018, 05:08 AM »
Ha, ha, ha, just do your maths.

DO 12 is fighting its last battle here, early Summer of 2019 should see DO 13. So the only relevant "question" - well, not really, I think I know the answer - here is, is the major upgrade 12>13 included or not, i.e. will it cost the usual price instead.

Christmas 2017, they did NOT have any such offer, and of course not, since there was no to-be-paid-then upgrade in sight, but now it is.

Years ago, they were on bits, within the same scheme, just months before the end of the line of the current version, but early enough for the then pending upgrade to be regularly-priced.

And since there's not a thing about this situation in the ad above, I suppose they try to treat us here as dumb as many bits customers are.

Minus 40 p.c. and then just months later minus 40 p.c. again is, well, above 100 % in total.

7
E.g. for RightNote: "Organisation: Multiple outlining options", and then, not so good for creative writing.

There a catch: You should not get to conclusions without mentioning the technical details which get you there.

For example, RN is one of those db-based 2-pane outliners which do NOT offer item / sub-tree cloning ("live" duplication, i.e. not copying, but replicating them to other branches); such critera are very important / decisive, so not mentioning them in part invalidates such, should I say "comparisons"?

Then, the "discussion" in this thread has become meandrous, as far as I'm concerned, but I'm ready to admit that even the original purpose of this thread would have been an impossible one, "writers' tools" being too much of a scope, since it would include any sorts of adjacent tools, too, whilst there's obviously not enough room left for the core applications, and even there, the core concepts ain't that much individualized.

(I've said it on the outliner forum recently, any text's striving, texts beyond say 1-page, and even that's debatable, should be for its optimized construction, that paradigm implying, of course, that in due course of optimizing construction, lacks in topic development should become evident, and should be handled, too.)

But whatever, the core problem with such tools is the fact that most characterists in them are implemented in a resolutely "me-too"-fashion, not taking account of writers' needs, so...

I'm not going to steal my, and yours, time, by dissecting, e.g., an application like "Final Draft", but you see, even the name of the "game", the application's name, indicates that it has never been devised for intermediate stages of writing, but in order to stay "competitive", they add all sorts of crap to it, making believe possible users that they could do construction work, too, with that application, which of course isn't true but to a really imagination-crippling degree, and as for quite another kind of writing, it's appalling of course that some application as UltraRecall isn't able to let you replace some term, "book"-wide, project-wide, sub-tree-wide, let alone file-wide, with some other.

And that's not even speaking of above-mentioned RN and other applications which are me-too from a to z.

Thus, any imaginable "comparison" is an elude in frustration, but that's not a reason for leaving out core criteria to begin with, I'd say.

8
Living Room / Re: Does Al-Tubaigy Has Free Dates?
« on: December 08, 2018, 01:35 PM »
Well, mouser, I had presupposed

- that readers recognize my irony; this thread's only on the spectacular primitivism of some people posing as threads and trying to extort big money, not on torture (wants), not on software - hence the "Living Room" subforum I chose for it

- that your yard dogs recognize my pen name (as non-spamming; as never-spamming, and that should be totally independent of my respective titling).

And, with all due respect, I don't see what your post, except for its inherent (i.e. not outspoken) thread (which I think is in relation to my analysis of the wraith808 experience), would add to mine, except that it implies our readers will NOT have got my message; yours just translating it for the imbeciles (of which we don't have any here I hope).

9
ATTN Sophists You Can Learn Something Here (no, not from me for once):

Even some 3-years-olds in the sandpit are able to play foul already; if you have such people as our boss, more than 20 years later, you're more or less done; change employer asap, without them letting the time to destruct in part your credentials.

When you do the "complete style" (or whatever you like to call it), you type lots of characters, and if you don't redact then - being paid for what you will have written -, there will not only be typos, but also sometimes some obscure elements where you will not have formulated your thought to the best; in many occurrences, the context at least will then indicate what you will have meant.

On the other hand, if you do the very sparse style, there is no context to explain if needed, so you better be perfectly clear, and the above specimens are such wonderful examples of being almost inscrutable that you invariably end up - at the very moment the author announces the break of the "conversation" - with thinking that that's been on purpose; as implied above, we know that style from within the corporate world when it's not about clarifying things together, but to butcher an opponent/subordinate.

For example, if you're able to make any sense of "There are cases where the images are encoded in the streams, but they wouldn't be for this.", you're really, really strong; being sparse, AND leaving out core elements then, is no "conversation" at all.

Btw - and not even mentioning the fact that the usual meaning of streaming is "sending data to the pc, without that data being stored on that pc" (so the usual downloaders cannot save it but by filming the screen) - e.g. pics are indeed embedded in a very weird way sometimes, e.g. in rtf where the whole pic code is simply replicated (copied) into the rtf text, just with some special code before and after that, in case, millions of characters describing the pic; on the other hand, I've never heard of such a thing in web programming, where the pics and other elements are not embedded within the page's code - would that be even possible? -, but linked, for separate download indeed (i.e. all the pic or other code is within its own, dedicated file), be that from the same server or from others; as said, some code complicates things in order to make downloads more or less impossible, by the http links referring not to the special files, but back to the php server code which then sends back (or not) the data, perhaps even just "streaming" it, so that it doesn't get onto your hdd (browser cache) - don't know how they make it, but doesn't matter here.

The above "conversation" is a classic exemple where one participant naively thinks of getting things clarified, whilst the other strives to make appear his "opponent" stupid, systematically just giving away tiniest bits, from which the naive participant tries to get some meaning, instead of saying, early on, if you express yourself in just some sparse words, make them meaningful; just the sudden aggression some sparse posts later will then open his eyes and make him discover the foul play he's being subjected, his naive thinking "he doesn't do it on purpose, he just expresses himself badly, so let's see if we can make any sense out of it anyway" prevents him from seeing the situation as it is.

When in the corporate world, such people begin to aggress you openly, in the end, it'll be already too late, so you're probably well-advised to never even enter such foul play of others, and that means, never try to obscure things but immediately say you don't understand - of course, and as you see here in this current example, they will say that's your fault, so be it, but break their foul play and get a new employer, but don't enter their scheme since you will end up with taking decisions "for them" they will then fervently disown, making you responsible for big losses for the corporation (of which these people give a shit, their agenda being a sadistic one).

Many of you will have (out)lived (or will have been broken in) such a situation, which is a frequent one in the corporate world (or, of course, in public administration); of course, you will not be aware of such a stratagem in "play" situations like ours here, but you should be, at any moment, in professional ones:

Trying to fill up the allegedly unintentional omissions of others is among the most dangerous situation you could ever encounter in your professional life; you'll find yourself on some icecap which then will break under your feet.

Of course it's a shame you'll need to be paranoid in order to survive, but there are indicators for WHEN it's necessary to enter paramode, and the above "conversation" is a classic example of the victim not having seen the strong indicator, so you can indeed learn something here indeed, and be it just for a refresh and reminder.


P.S. That's "website assets" indeed, but quite rarely "assets"; even on Quora, you'll find a "what the hell is that", and the problem doesn't lie within the (unusual) expression, but in the obvious and repeated (above) refusal to clarify, i.e. the will to maintain the misunderstanding.


EDIT: Oh, I forgot: In the old days, there were even school teachers for whom the day wasn't a successful one if, in the way described above, they hadn't made cry at least one of their pupils (10, 12 years old) in at least one of their classes. Those times are over now in civilized countries; corporations and administrations, as said, remain a jungle in which such predators can run rampant still.

10
Offer a now-to-be-installed 6 months trial for which the prospect will probably be in need of in some 7, 8, 9 months - and possibly get even good "reviews" for spending big ad money, speaking in general here and not in allusion to any specific software (it's just an idea of mine)


Some mass-market computer journals, in their (more expensive) DVD version, often come with a "full version" of "Stellar Phoenix Data Recovery" (preposterous name if there is any), and that's also here and then on some give-away sites.

Just some days ago, I saw it again in some of these journals, so I looked into the latter, and right, in quite tiny character size, they told you, somewhere, that it's a "fully-functional 6 months license" you had to install almost immediately so the counter could start to run.

I had installed that thing, from another, similar source, some 18 months ago, and then, some 9 month ago, I made a little mistake - I mean the harm done was not so big -, and was in need of such a program, on a comp no other tool of this kind was installed; I had the spectacular GetDataBack installed on another pc only - Kroll's is as good as the latter (I had tried both, both with success, and many others of which most failed, some years ago on a real ugly problem, some unreadable usb stick), but incredibly overpriced (subscription).

So from that "Stellar" thing, I got told, "your license has expired"; the problem here, I hadn't had the slightest idea of the time limit of my "license", and I pay attention to such things, so I'm quite sure that at the time, they didn't say a word about that, but I can't pretend for sure they didn't,

Fact is though, currently (at the very least), they say so, except of course for the fact that many a people buy those crap journals, with a big, fat "Full license of Stellar included" on the cover, FOR that "full version", and then will (hopefully, but it's too late anyway for not spending the money) discover at home they will have got an extended, but very probably useless trial.

Btw, when I had installed my "full version" of that thing, there was NO mention that it was limited to 6 months on the screen - but perhaps somewhere within the "endless" general conditions nobody reads for such things; I don't know about the current state of affairs though.

Anyway, if there is no such info (as was in my case) you think there will be help in case of data loss, and there is not; people who lose data every some weeks, so that they will really and possibly take advantage of this tool, should not work on computers anyway.

So what's the outcome? If you KNEW about the limitation, you possibly say to yourself, my fault; I buy it then (and that's the idea here); on the other hand, if you remember you had bought the crap journal for this tool, without knowing it'd work for just 6 months in case, you will probably NOT buy, so they clearly play with your memory limits here; but if this info comes as news for you now (as in my case), I cannot imagine somebody masochistic enough in order to buy the license.

Sometimes - this is not the case with "Stellar" -, those journals print a tiny "special edition" beneath the name of the software, and "special edition" invariably means "crippled and/or time-limited version"; for details, you must then search thru the journal.

There's another aspect to this form of marketing, done within mass-market journals: You probably get lots of good "reviews", because you're a good customer to those journals - of course, you (i.e. the developer) pay lots of money for this prominence -

whilst the naive journal reader might think it's the journal which pays the developer, in order to get the chance to spice up the journal, so that it gets more buyers on the newsstand.

Fact is, in the case of data loss, it's a very good thing for the recovery tool to be already installed in your system, so just buying a license may be tempting if, well, if, you're not sufficiently in anger against that tool which now lets you down if you don't pay something around 100 bucks in order to get help, from a program which you will not have chosen by any criteria, but which just sits there, already installed but not working before paying:

It's not a trojan, but you see what I mean: There are (far) more than a dozen such programs, and this one here got its way into your system in quite a vicious way; in some way it's certainly a smart way to beat the competition, but then, you feel the (lack of) "choice" you have now (paying, forgetting your data or getting out your hdd into another system, for the installation of some OTHER, probably better data recovery tool not further harming your lost data) has been FORCED upon you, by some marketing geeks:

In other words, if being buggered isn't your thing, you will not be happy with the situation.

On the site of PCMag - PCMag being one of those mass-market computer journals which have been done this add-on software marketing for more than 20 years now - "Stellar", together with Kroll, is the "Editor's Choice", whilst GetDataBack is not even mentioned, whilst I can confirm it's on par with Kroll, and of course I don't have the right to infer any conclusions from this, but I have the right to ask, how many times "Stellar" has been a free add-on in PCMag over the years, how much did "Stellar" pay for this, in case, and did PCMag seriously review GetDataBack, too, before leaving it all out of its comparison table?

In any case, this "Stellar" marketing can be described as "very aggressive" and "not very open" - even today, you only get the limits by searching inside the journal for them, so it would be of high interest for the competition to know about the conversion rate when users get their "your license has expired" slap into their face.

What the competition could do, in the meantime, though:

Market a journal version which really works once (and even after 6 months), and then, AFTER the (hopefully) successful recovery, invite the user to buy it now, with 40 p.c. off, for further use. (The question which arises here, being: Will journals even charge you for this, real, added value to the journal? Not even thinking of them paying you for it...)


If I ever find back that "unreadable" usb stick (which, as said, GetDataBack and Kroll could read, without any fault for both, but which even TestDisk, the mythical read-it-all tool could not), I'll promise I'll try with "Stellar" and update this.

In my case some months ago, the harm wasn't so much as to justify getting the hdd out, so I tried - unsuccessfully - with (the also-installed) Recuva, then left it at that.

And of course, even if functional tools are installed already, pull the LAN plug as early as possible (and close down the WLAN connection, too).

Btw, it's a known fact - also proven in numerous legal proceedings over many countries -, that again and again, so-called financial advisors very often recommend - what do I say: push - those investments that pay them the highest commissions; it's another fact that those mass-market journals I regularly see the software offers of on the newsstand, with few exceptions, do not offer some tool today, and then, some months later, the respective tool from another competitor, but those very same tools again and again, as if there were no other in that category: Even if you just superficially monitor those journals, month after month and over the years, you will discover this - you just don't have the right to draw any product-specific conclusions from your observation.

11
"O...k.  I was referring to from a programming perspective." - and since I had perfectly grasped that, I had added the ";-)".

As for the rest, ok, no problem, I don't understand your telegram style anyway, my fault assuredly.


In order to clarify: I never meant the page is in one piece*, but there is a core html code of the page which triggers download of any sorts of elements, be that pics (mostly from the same server) or ads (mostly from other servers), and of course, these disparate elements are downloaded separately, but by the code in the "page source code" (which in case could trigger some server code which then only downloads those elements, or not), BUT there is some group of elements which, together, form the core page, and then there are unwanted elements, ads or others; the term "assets" here is obviously misused for "page elements", and "stream" is left as is, whilst it's obvious from the above there would have been some need to differentiate it from "download".

It's called "playing on words, in order to obfuscate, in order to display knowledge, without giving any knowledge away".

12
Curt, re-read the developer's page, where he claims that his competitors do, but badly, what we can see on your screenshot, whilst his tools doesn't do it, so according to that page, what we see on the screenshot, will have been done by hand.

Either that, or the developer dumps his own tool, by more than just grossly misdescribing it; as said, re-read his own page; there's nothing on "lines", and about ysour "doing the job well", why then the developer goes into lengths, justifying it NOT doing it, when you say it does it? Wouldn't that qualify for craziness, from the part of the developer himself?

Anyway, the Bits price was 10 bucks, it's now 14 bucks on Bits, as a permanent offer, and I convene with you that if it does what it's originally expected to do, it'd be even worth the 26 bucks you mention - if the user's able to free his mind of what he's read from the developer, and of what he will invariably have deducted from that.

You seem to try to defend the developer, whilst in fact you charge him with insanity - or then I totally misread what he wrote. Fact is, invited to comment on this on Bits, he chose to remain silent.

Weird, wouldn't you agree?

And "hate" is something totally different; I had mentioned it for its spectacular weirdness only, and you add to it. ;-)

13
Living Room / Does Al-Tubaigy Has Free Dates?
« on: December 07, 2018, 05:44 PM »
You know, that currently most famous pathologist world-wide. Why so? Well, there would be another appointment for him in perspective, in order to return to the right way some, well, let's call it, asshole. Nothing really pernicious, but quite a nuisance, quand même ! So, cutting off of him some of his larcenous fingers would probably do him VERY good, and to society assuredly, it's the Shariah way, for the real nuisances.


Around a week or so, very late in the evening, I received the following mail:

Virus alert - <[email protected]> - [email protected] has been hacked! Change your password immediately!

I have very bad news for you.
03/10/2018 - on this day I hacked your OS and got full access to your account [email protected]

So, you can change the password, yes.. But my malware intercepts it every time.

How I made it:
In the software of the router, through which you went online, was a vulnerability.
I just hacked this router and placed my malicious code on it.
When you went online, my trojan was installed on the OS of your device [!].

After that, I made a full dump of your disk (I have all your address book, history of viewing sites, all files, phone numbers and addresses of all your contacts).

A month ago, I wanted to lock your device [!] and ask for a not big amount of btc to unlock.
But I looked at the sites [!] that you regularly visit, and I was shocked by what I saw!!!
I'm talk you about sites for adults.

I want to say - you are a BIG pervert. Your fantasy is shifted far away from the normal course! [!]

And I got an idea....
I made a screenshot of the adult sites where you have fun (do you understand what it is about, huh?).
After that, I made a screenshot of your joys (using the camera of your device) [!] and glued them together.
Turned out amazing! You are so spectacular!

I'm know that you would not like to show these screenshots to your friends, relatives or colleagues.
I think $710 is a very, very small amount for my silence.
Besides, I have been spying on you for so long, having spent a lot of time!

Pay ONLY in Bitcoins!
My BTC wallet: 13hjTSbwVJfsDgL3qaQSu3fs2qmHQCHRXT

You do not know how to use bitcoins?
Enter a query in any search engine: "how to replenish btc wallet".
It's extremely easy

For this payment I give you two days (48 hours).
As soon as this letter is opened, the timer will work.

After payment, my virus and dirty screenshots with your enjoys will be self-destruct automatically.
If I do not receive from you the specified amount, then your device will be locked, and all your contacts will receive a screenshots with your "enjoys".

I hope you understand your situation.
- Do not try to find and destroy my virus! (All your data, files and screenshots is already uploaded to a remote server)
- Do not try to contact me (you yourself will see that this is impossible, the sender address is automatically generated)
- Various security services will not help you; formatting a disk or destroying a device will not help, since your data is already on a remote server.

P.S. You are not my single victim. so, I guarantee you that I will not disturb you again after payment!
This is the word of honor hacker [! hear hear!]

I also ask you to regularly update your antiviruses in the future. This way you will no longer fall into a similar situation.

Do not hold evil! I just do my job. [! So that would be called a career criminal?]
Good luck.




Now don't take me wrong. As said, I received this mail very late in the evening, and though, some 15 minutes later, I was already asleep, so no harm done in my case, I don't hate this asshole in the slightest, I just want him to live on without his thievery fingers asap.

He does not know anything about my "device", he does not know anything of my "fantasy" - but then, it's news to me that a(n imaginary-only, of course, in view of my age) predilection for normal intercourse with girls aged 18 to 30 (whilst being quite happy with some quite older model in real life, or as the French say: "If you don't have what you love, you better love what you have (got)!") was "shifted far away from the normal course!" - wow: times have quite changed, then!

And of course, none of my "devices" got any camera, except for a simple phone which I only use for calling (incl. incoming calls), and which is permanently stored, the lens touching the shelf; my dedicated camera being stored within a cupboard.

This being said, I wonder though what could be the percentage or rather the per mills, of people NOT sleeping after receiving such a piece of half-baked shit, or who even would pay: so better Al-Tubaigy took care of such assholes, in the end, right? ;-)

On the other hand, that was quite a change from the usual "I'm from Africa, and you'll get x per cent of the multi-million transfer", the latest one of those even started his mail by a hilarious "I present myself as Sir." - no kidding, even I couldn't invent such crazy things!

14
Living Room / 100 Photoshop Bombs
« on: December 07, 2018, 11:48 AM »
Isn't that a lovely one?:

https://www.computer...op-1-8468544.html#35

And that's Patrick, the frozen chicken with a name:

https://www.vice.com...source=vicetwitterin

Today we'll eat Patrick, and tomorrow we'll kill Jane, his sister.

Oh, the good ol' times on the family farm!

15
"When you open a connection via http to get the ad" - I'd never do this! ;-) Also, your "they never touch the asset" was completely obscure for me - btw, I hereby copyright the comedy line "Don't touch my assets" (for "my private parts") - you meant they (the ad-blockers) don't download (what you call "stream"?) the ads, from third-party (i.e. not the page's) server? Or better, they intercept/block that download? ("not touching the asset" for "block the download of the ads" was too exotic for me, in order to understand, hence parts of my meanderings; in fact, the ads are the crap, the core page would be the "asset", but I would never tell it that...) ;-)

As far as my knowledge goes, the page is downloaded.

In its html, there is javascript which downloads ads from third-party servers.
(Also, some ads, here and there, can be included within the page html, but that's quite rare.)

Now, before the browser displaying the page (and thus following the download links in the html, too), the ad-blocker purifies the page script and gives it to the browser only then, for the browser to display what's left from the original page script.

Also, the page script sends back info to the page's server, in order for that server to check if everything has been displayed, incl. the ads; the ad-blocker cannot block that sending-back since then the server would know the ads have not been downloaded (and of course, the amount of downloaded (what you call "stream", or is that something different?) bytes can be monitored and sent back to the server.

Since that (in case, encoded) "everything's ok" info sent back to the server could only be sent after everything's fine, I even suppose the core info (i.e. the page to be displayed) isn't even included in what the server sends first, since if it did, the page could be displayed in full - all the info was there already -, even if then there was "problems" with the ad-loading: the server would be unable to stop the page display, even by knewing the ads weren't displayed - but could block the IP address for further downloads then.

The sent amounts of bytes downloaded (streamed???) would be identical, if the page is fully displayed (i.e. with the ads) or not (i.e. without the ads); the difference between download and stream, as far as my knowledge goes, is with download = stored in the browser cache and stream = just displayed on screen, without any storage on the user pc, right?

So I suppose that if download, not stream, there would be means of not displaying the (downloaded) ads, without the page's server knowing about this.

We convene that one of the tasks of the ad-blocker consists in blocking unnecessary traffic, i.e. blocking ads-download (stream???), hence the knowing of blocking of the page's server, by counting.

My argument above concerns pages which are sufficiently important for the user in order for them to accept the traffic caused by additional downloads (streams???), but where they do not want to be visually bothered with all that crap. Hence my idea that for "renowned" "standard" sites, a (reasonably-priced) ad-blocker could, by individual option for every one of these sites (the ones for Germany, I mentioned above), process these sites - IF that was possible along my ideas, without having to cope with every single page individually for that (which would be practically impossible, see above) - differently from the "regular" ones: allow for download/streaming of the ads, but kill/hide them afterwards, and without the page's server knowing about this.

Don't ask me about the advertizer's interest here since in fact, I happen to avoid them whenever possible if they had bothered me before, so it's to their advantage, at the end of the day, if I do NOT see their advertizing; I would not go so far as to say they pay for this favor, though, hence my idea to pay a reasonable fee p.a. for such a spice-up ad-blocker (20 bucks or so).

Also, sending back of info to the third-party, the ads', servers, would be possible, but here again, once they have been downloaded (streamed???) - for these special pages, those advertisers should NOT be able to detect their ads have not been displayed.

Errors of mine, ideas / info of yours? ;-)

16
@cranoscopial: I had not even seen that typo, but your discovery is just another hint at developers to run some spelling checker at the end (most Germans do so, and then their texts are full of "sie" instead of "Sie", and vice versa, "sie" being "they" and "Sie" being "your"...).

As for the work this aligner obviously isn't willing to do, of course there are dots, "full stops", at the end of sentences, but also after abbreviations, but after most abbreviations, the next word begins with a lower case letter; most sentences begin with an uppercase one, and as for ^r^n, ^r and ^n, which, especially for text downloaded from the web, create havoc for any script, I first normalize them to ^n, then run the script, then normalize them to ^r^n; any aligner should do so, too, instead of trying to cope with all 3 variants at the same time which is unsuccessful anyway.

Then, there are lengths, German and French being some 10 or 15 p.c. longer than the corresponding English text in most cases for example, so an aligner, while taking such differences into account, should compare character counts, too, before deciding if a dot is a full stop (new sentence; new visual "paragraph" on screen then if the users opts for that) or not; other simple tricks could apply, too, and then you minimize errors of such a tool, in this really simple task.

Btw, it's debatable if the systematic left block - right block paradigm is really optimized for every use case, I'd prefer the sentences being one beneath the other, then a blank line, the two "blocks" being distinguished by different color, but it's perfectly conceivable there be aligners who do it that way already.

But anyway, the developer in question obviously makes a lot of fuss around a (what's more, very simple) core task of any aligner, AND tries to "sell" that miss as an advantage of his tool, on top of this. Also, there is no mass market for aligners, so he faces prospects who should be able to see this them misleading of his, and that makes it all the less comprehensible even. ;-)

17
@wraith808: I don't get this. In fact, the page itself (javascript) sends data back, telling the respective server that the ads have not been displayed, or something along these lines. Or/and the other way round, in case of successful display of the ads, the page sends some "ok" string (which may be quite elaborate, unfortunately).

So I understand that these "false positives" I'm asking for would be individual for each such site, which is why this could only be done for those "big" sites of if not universal then at least national appeal (in big nations), like the examples I gave above. Also, the site owners would frequently "update", i.e. modify those "got thru" or "were banned" strings; it'd be a little bit like downloading from Flickr and the like; frequent ad-blocker updates would be needed for given "standard sites", by subscription, for once.

Site owners could monitor what the ad-blockers did, by running a dummy pc with those ad-blockers installed; ad-blockers' developers could monitor the changes in the sent-back strings by running pc's with and without ad-blocking.

Sites would change those strings several times a day in the end; ad-blockers would not keep up (with sending updates).

So that's probably why that isn't done, but if it's NOT a mass market, but a quite confidential one, it'd be doable - the question arises of course how long a reasonably-priced such offer would remain confidential...

(Additional problem: The site owners could encode those strings in some individualized way, according to the page's url, title or the like; basic problem here: we all have accepted that downloaded pages (or even before download) also SENT BACK data; if that was not the case, they simply wouldn't know.)



EDIT: Misunderstanding since I hadn't had in mind everything from my original post. You mean that for processing the advert part(s) of the page, the ad-blocker should sent the page, from the user's pc to the ad-blocker's server, then send the purified core part back; what I had in mind was something like "whiting it all" (since the data is there already, so make it invisible at least, and non-interactive). -

I had in mind that this processing of the ads would be quite simple, technically, and that the ad-blocker, installed as browser add-on, would have the necessary code for doing this, installed on the user's pc: just enough javascript in order to successfully identify the ad-parts, and make them invisible.

Of course, and according to my further thoughts above, it's to be feared that this "whiting" is then detected by some (upgraded, for this new necessity) page code.

What I had in mind, was something less consequential than what's done today, and which would be less detectable, but I suppose that's illusionary, the (spiced-up) page code would be able to detect pixel colors (or its own code to be invalidated), and then some preset, encoded string could be sent.

Of course, there could be another ad-blocking trick being envisioned: NOT interfering up to the full page being displayed (so there is a slight annoyance for the user indeed), THEN "do-it-all", and block any further sending back info to the server, like "bad connection", up to the user asking for some new page, and then ditto as before - in this scenario, the server(s) would get that AFTER each full download, the connection gets bad, and make their conclusions...

Or then, creating (user-pc-sided) a virtual representation, and infering from that, the real one, the server(s) not "getting" that the real representation on the user's screen isn't identical to the virtual page they will have created.

In this context, let's remind ourselves that the ads often come from third-party servers, and that was the aspect I hadn't in my mind; you mean that for bandwidth minimization, the ad-blockers block the download of the ads already.

Hence:

I think there should be possible technical means for those prominent, "special" sites, that you can NOT see without ads today: If I want to see them currently (with a browser exception or in another browser), I have to convene to any download they want to force upon me, anyway, SO the ad-blockers, in these instances, by special option, should NOT block the download (i.e. my traffic would be the same anyway), just block the display (and the interactivity, too) - possibly, there ARE some means for this, along my ideas here, as soon as ad-blockers free themselves from the conception that blocking ads necessarily implies blocking their download, too.

Considering there are "prominent" sites which at the end of the day would be worth the traffic, just not all the visual annoyance.

18
Last comment on Bits for that: http://www.bitsdujou...=search-for-software :


"The page linked as "Website" above goes into length criticising the competition, stating (my wordings here) that the automatisms there (sentences, paragraphs) do it wrongly, and then you must do it manually anyway, and thus, with Nova, which forces you to do it manually to begin with, that's the real way to do it. The page states this manual way of doing it in Nova is a simple as it gets, but it doesn't tell us HOW this process is facilitated by Nova; also, and with all due respect, I would like to know WHERE the alleged advantage of Nova (except for the price of a mere 10$ of course) over the competition lies, since logically, even if the manual processing in Nova is easy/simple:

If some of the automated competitors do 8 new paragraph dividers right and 1 wrong, I immediately see this on screen, from the faulty length - this being a big difference with for example OCR where I would need to read the whole text attentively, in order to look up processing errors -, I put the mouse cursor there, then either delete the faulty paragraph divider, or insert the missing one - also, I firmly believe that such a mistake will not occur once a page with the automated competition but perhaps once every third or fourth page or the like -; at the same time, with Nova, I must put in all the 9 dividers of my example manually, be that easy or not.

So from what I conceive, Nova just seems to be grossly inferior to its competitors and does not present the alleged - and NOT explained - advantage over its competition at all, but I'd welcome any pertinent information.

Would it be too harsh to say that from what I read from the current text on the linked page, it seems that text tries to turn a big disadvantage into a feigned advantage, hoping readers will not grasp the amount of additional work they will have to do in Nova, over what they would have to do with some competitor's tool? Fact is, I read that text with interest and then had to realize it didn't answer any of my questions but just built up something I felt like being allegedly illusionary expectations in order to blur my discernment."


Referring to this page: https://nova-text-aligner.soft112.com/ : "NOVA Text Aligner is a tool designed to make manual text alignment as easy and simple as possible. It doesn't use any automatic paragraph or sentence alignment algorithms. Why? Because there are things where a human can not be replaced and parallel text editing is such a thing." and blah blah blah on that matter - no comment from the developer.

Please note the logical bomb in the little text cited: He states that there is no alignment (!) automatism in his tool, and for justifying this, he claims "a human can not be replaced" in "parallel text EDITING" (my formatting): In order to justify his not having done his homework for step 1, he pretends no tool of this kind could help with step 2, and you might agree that these steps are clearly distinct, for once.

Would you buy software from a developer who's so deeply at war with logic? Or am I too harsh here? ;-)

19
Thank you, both of you, and as always, Shades' contributions really constructive!

"Also, whenever it is possible, I do not click on the 'Accept cookies' button from a web site." - I said so here, some weeks ago, in some other context, complaining about the fact that then, often, just 2/3, or even just the half of the screen height is left for my reading! ;-(

As for propaganda sites (formerly "Newspapers" ' sites) I don't have access without allowing ads:

http://www.bild.de (Springer for the masses, but for the "very latest news", i.e. the things that have happened within the very last 2 hours or so, they're often really informative; the alternative for this being dailymail.com, though - but then, no day without "royals" et al. on dailymail.com, and that makes me vomit)

http://www.faz.de (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 30 years ago, that was the best (continental) European newspaper, together with Le Monde, at the time; both are finished now as serious information sources)

http://www.sueddeutsche.de (Süddeutsche Zeitung, informally "Prantl-Prawda", was very good, too, before Prantl as editor-in-chief)

http://www.spiegel.de (Der Spiegel, world-best news-weekly 30 years ago; at the time, Der Spiegel was sufficient reason for some to learn German, not kidding! - their incredible, mythical, multi-km-broad archives were the starting point for my interest in information management / technology; today, their site - the printed publication remains slightly more acceptable in parts - is almost-pure propaganda shit; it's from Bertelsmann, the censorship specialists - not kidding here either, they've made a business model out of censoring)

So why my interest in these sites then? Since the above leaves me with http://www.focus.de for getting some Germany-specific news, and the latter is a brainwashing site for 5-year-olds.


Again, I think a good ad-blocker should SIMULATE that the ads have been displayed, or then, stop any page-specific feedback altogether / send false data back.


Not knowing about AdGuard's possible advantages over the "free" alternatives. Again setting up an alternative system for such crap use like trialing software; my XP on that one just not being successful anymore with most modern software; last time I had bought a cheap W7 Pro version from some British crook, it seemed to work fine, I left a nice appreciation for the (commercial) vendor, and then, after some 30 days, my W7 stopped working, the MS screen telling me it wasn't legitimate, and then the vendor never wrote back upon my several reminders.

So never leave positive appreciations for somebody on ebay before 55 days!

(Currently installing some cheap W10 Pro version from some German commercial vendor (English version again - with any other version you just multiply problems of all kinds, not the least not remembering by which search terms you'll get help) just asking me to pay again by PayPal, after me having paid by PayPal upon purchase - let's see if PayPal took the money and ran, or if just vendor's accounting is shit.)

(I have to admit that when installing-activating the Brit W7, I had not thought about setting my VPN to Minuscule Britain, assuming MS - which doesn't pay much taxes within the EU but presumably insists on "users" only using their OS within the country of original commercialization - stops W versions if they detect they've left their "original" country, so this time, for activation of my new "alternative W10" now, I'll set it to Germany then; if after that, they even check for use later use, I'll be probably screwed again, sooner of later, not remembering to do ALL web access by alleged-German VPS afterwards, should certainly make it the default setting to begin with, in order to minimize risks...)

(So much info is floating around; in real life, you just happen to not remember all of it at every little moment.)

20
"Ideally, we would use a Wiki for those...". Not.

21
Since my question in the discount section was not answered:


"Re AdGuard: Since it's by subscription, can anybody confirm that it allows for viewing/browsing main "newspaper" and other propaganda sites which systematically leave you out if you use the usual adblocker (e.g. Adblock, Adblock Plus), and if so, which ones (and understood of course that you do NOT make an "exception")?

If there is some link to something potentially important, I open it then in Edge instead of FF, but I don't browse such sites anymore.

If the above is not the case, why is AdGuard so well regarded her in this forum? Since Adblock Plus works fine, too, for the sites remaining for me. Is it just because of "for once, the developer gets paid!"? Well, Adblock Plus's one gets paid, too - some call that extortion, but he wins the actions against him, up to now.

So I would really be interested in some pertinent information, and ideally along the lines, "is not blocked by adblocker-blocking sites, for most of them.""


So, what the heck with a paid / subscription ad-blocker, since the others work well, except for being detected by more and more sites?


Or in other words, yes, a non-(frequently) detectable ad-blocker would be worth its money again!

But then, why is that so difficult, since even with the usual ad-blockers of today, the whole crap is downloaded to your system first, THEN only your ad-blocker begins it discarding work?

22
Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Black Friday / Cyber Monday 2018
« on: December 01, 2018, 11:15 AM »
""'Typewriter' is the longest word that can be made using the keys on only one row of the keyboard.""

That would probably be correct for the English language only; I'm sure Germans can do better there; anyway, considering that keyboards had been devised to slow down typing. the real problems that will never be attacked anymore lay elsewhere. (I suppose that dictating will become ubiquitous before more broader adoption of "fast-typing" keyboards, the ones with a rehauled character distribution.)

23
EDIT OF THE ABOVE:

matchtext
wanted(text) (which is not included in the match)
notwanted(text) (which is not included in the match)


BETTER:

You have your:

- matchstring
i.e. the string (IF it matches of course, and that's to be checked first by the regex engine), to be declared a match IF the lookbehing/lookahead condition(s) IS/are met resp. NOT met

- wantedstring(s)
i.e. the string(s) (which are not included in the match)  and which MUST be there (i.e. before resp. after the matchstring), in order to declare the (matching) matchstring a match

- unwantedstring(s)
i.e. as before but if these strings are matched there, your (originally matching) matchstring match is declared UN-successful by the regex engine (i.e. the unwantedstring "must not" be there, in the sense of "is not allowed to be there"; I insist on this fact since in some other languages, "must not" is synonym for "may be there or not, "is optional", and that's NOT the case here)

Also, let's remind of the fact that there can be, in case, a negative or positive lookbehind, and ALSO a negative or positive lookahead, if the regex engine in question doesn't stumble upon such combinations; and that of course, the 3 different strings have nothing to do with each other: the engine
- tries to match the matchstring
- if that's successful, it tries to match the lookbehind
- if that's successful AND does not discard the match (ie in case of a negative lookbehind), it tries to match the lookahead
- if successful (and does not discard the match (ie in case of a negative lookahead), the match is deemed successful, and that'll ONLY be the matchstring then (and that's the reason why the lookbehind/lookahead parentheses () are NOT counted as elements for replacements then: After having served for validating or invalidating the matchstring match, they go back into oblivion, as far as regex is concerned.

I'm insisting on these facts since, in view of lookbehinds/lookaheads being extremely simple, the obvious difficulty people have with them must lie with misconceptions they could have, around them.

/END OF EDIT



EDIT: "!" is the logical "not", so it's logical that this character is used in negative lookarounds; the "?", in regex in general, stands for "0 or 1 (!) occurrences of the preceding (!) element"; for distinguishing simple linebreaks from double / multiple ones, you'll use a complete lookaround, e.g. in "replace (?<!\n)\n(?!\n) by \n\n" which would only replace the single ones by two, but would not multiply the double or multiple ones; this is of interest e.g. for normalizing web downloads where the title for the next paragraph often clings to the previous one; of course you could implement an additional condition of a max line length, in order for that single \n to be (matched >) changed within that given line character number limit, in order for the code not to affect (most) regular sub-paragraph breaks within regular, broader paragraphs of the source material.

(EDIT: Don't forget the lookbehind-"<": it's necessary since in real life, there often would be other string parts, even before the lookbehind, needing disambiguation.)

24
Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Black Friday / Cyber Monday 2018
« on: November 25, 2018, 09:47 AM »
"Which is why I don't go for that kind of crap at all anymore."

Please see here: https://www.donation...ndex.php?topic=43835 (post of today)

25
Make your (in case cheap, quality-wise) software cheap for some hours/days (Black-Friday, Silver-Monday or whatever they call it...), in order to get a paid trial (quick-n-dirty buys), at the very least, or even a new, loyal customer (if it's really good).

(spin-off of page of: https://www.donation...ndex.php?topic=46695 )


"Which is why I don't go for that kind of crap at all anymore.":

You mean the procedure, not necessarily the product(s) as such. - partly d'accord.

But then, it's also the "new customer syndrome", which is a sort of a paid trial: Often, you're not entirely sure you will have made the correct decision, in spite of some trialing (lack of time on your side, too, and especially lack of investment on your side, re time to thoroughfully put that piece of software to test), so the discount can be sort of an assurance against your not having decided optimally - cf. SyncBack buyers not having grasped in time they cannot do optimized backups with that: So their disturbance of piece of mind is lesser, afterwards, when they discover the ugly truth.

So this is even a little bit difference with gas, power or telephone contract users, since over there, all providers (who get new customers by such means) are similarly bad, with their call centres in - is it politically correct to name it?: - Mumbai.

Fact is, if some electronic goods are really good and helpful, you pay a lot more over time, even without subscriptions - IF, I said! -, and this then quite diminishes your initial savings - but which prove very beneficial for learning to identify the really pertinent criteria, for then buying smarter (and full price).

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