Recent Posts

301

Found Deals and Discounts / Forte Notation free until Sep 14

« Last post by x16wda on August 22, 2015, 10:23 PM »

Thanks Gizmo for this tip! (from this link)


I've written before about Forte Notation. It's a program which turns your PC into an electronic sheet of music paper (that stuff with rows of 5 lines on it). You can compose music, and listen to it, just by dragging and dropping notes into the correct place with your mouse. Keep dragging, and moving any note that doesn't sound right, until you end up with a tune you like.

Forte Notation has always been available as a limited-feature freeware edition. But until September 14th 2015, in order to celebrate half a million downloads, the company is now giving away full licences to the Basic edition. This normally costs $24, and has a number of features that the free version does not. You can export your composition as a wave file, for example, to play on any PC. And you can have more notes, verses, staves and so on.

To grab this $24 program for free, head to http://www.fortenota....com/en/lp/giveaway/ and enter your email address. You'll then receive a download link to the program, and a licence key (which you'll need immediately in order to install the program).

302

General Software Discussion / Re: Is Windows 10 a trojan?

« Last post by x16wda on August 16, 2015, 08:17 AM »

it's just getting guilted by association because it's new.

-Stoic Joker (August 16, 2015, 08:00 AM)

New name, anyway. This is Branchcache which has been around since 2009. Anyone who has had to deal with plants shutting down because their piddly T1 circuits have been preempted by Windows updates appreciates the concept.

303

Living Room / Re: I need help coming up with a plan to fix my NTFS security permissions problems

« Last post by x16wda on August 14, 2015, 05:23 PM »

What 40hz said - use groups. May not really apply to you at home, especially if you aren't trying to restrict access to anything, just plant that seed though.

That said, even if this wasn't an issue caused by FlexRaid, it would still leave a bad taste in my mouth because of what you're seeing. But I'd likely do what 4wd suggested, save off the data and completely recreate the FlexRaid setup from scratch and copy back in. I just don't know how far I would trust it going forward.

304

General Software Discussion / Re: What's living in your taskbar notification area right now?

« Last post by x16wda on August 10, 2015, 05:33 AM »

Sorry it has taken me so long to reply. I didn't quite know how to answer your various comments and questions to my ugly taskbar / notification area, because right after posting "Reply #31", I installed Stardock Start10, but in my setup it really looks the same as Win 10 (but without the errors), so only a few would ever notice the difference... But it's still not pretty (here on top of a black wallpaper):

With Start10:

 (see attachment in previous post)

At the moment my clipboard is Clipdiary from Softvoile.

-Curt (August 09, 2015, 03:30 AM)

Curt, this is off topic, but out of curiosity did you use Start8? I have not seen an email about an upgrade from Stardock. Also wondered how you are finding Clipdiary, how long you have been trying it out.

305

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10: Migration-woes thread

« Last post by x16wda on August 09, 2015, 01:03 PM »

I'm holding off a bit before hitting my main desktop PC since it's my workhorse (middle of the road though it is), but I went through the process with my laptop (which is actually newer and nicer) since it also has everything on it that I use and I can give it a good test. I had to start the process several times, ended up uninstalling antivirus (and some cruft that I should have cleaned out ages ago anyway), but what really seemed to help was switch from the 32 + 64 bit dvd over to the 64-bit only dvd.

Only real pain in the neck so far is that the Cisco IPSEC client is broken (of course) and the mitigations don't seem to work, in fact Win flat out refuses to let the program install. Rather than beat on that horse I switch to Shrewsoft which has worked fine.

Oh, and Photoshop CS3 says it isn't registered again (and how I hate trying to get stupid Adobe to do anything). Should have unregistered it before I started. <grumble grumble>

All in all not too bad, if nothing else comes up I will be set to upgrade my wife's pc... 

306

Living Room / Re: I need help coming up with a plan to fix my NTFS security permissions problems

« Last post by x16wda on August 06, 2015, 10:45 PM »

By all the tools did you include SetACL Studio? I would try installing it (30 day trial), take ownership at the root level and propagate it down all the way, then try giving everyone full at the root level and propagate down.

In any event the software ought to be able to delete folders for you later if you need to.

307

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 Privacy Concerns

« Last post by x16wda on August 04, 2015, 07:47 PM »

I don't type it in for them...because it's a guest network, I just make the password when I turn it on, then tell them what it is lol - Makes no difference cause once they leave my house, I shut it down, and just change the password the next time it needs to go on...though, it's rare I have guests...so it's rare that I need to do it ^_^

-Stephen66515 (August 04, 2015, 06:16 PM)

I have a guest network. The kids' machines use it, and I turn it off when they need to get to bed.  

308

General Software Discussion / Re: Beware: A Dangerous Windows 10 Ransomware Scam Is Spreading Online

« Last post by x16wda on August 03, 2015, 06:49 PM »

Part of the delight is that Microsoft never mentioned (at least in anything I saw) just what this notification would look like. I even did a quick search, and couldn't find a picture. I went ahead and pulled down all 5 of the ISOs I need and have worked from there, but just got the notification on my main box. And in case you haven't yet seen it, the "Windows 10 Upgrade is Ready Notification" looks like.... this:

309

General Software Discussion / Beware: A Dangerous Windows 10 Ransomware Scam Is Spreading Online

« Last post by x16wda on August 03, 2015, 05:27 AM »

Just in time for the new week, we have this from fosshub.

We have bets in at work on which client will report this to us first after honkling their file server... (honkling = a whole letter worse than just honking a box...)

According to the Cisco’s security team, they have found a new scamming campaign that spreads CTB-Locker ransomware. This trouble comes in the form of a fake Microsoft email, telling Windows users that their Windows 10 download is ready.

These messages in Windows 10 ransomware scam mimic the emails sent by Microsoft, along with some text mistakes and changes. However, scammers have managed to spoof the address of origin as [email protected]. To make the messages look more authentic, attackers are using the same color scheme used by Microsoft to fool the users. Thus, these emails look more legitimate.

310

General Software Discussion / Re: Simple network drivemapping utility

« Last post by x16wda on July 29, 2015, 08:51 PM »

Batch is great for a lot of things. You could use some of these utilities from Horst Shaeffer to tart up a batch file nicely enough, winput.exe can ask prettily for some input from your users.

311

General Software Discussion / Re: What's living in your taskbar notification area right now?

« Last post by x16wda on July 22, 2015, 07:50 PM »

Way too much.

Remove Hardware, Bluetooth, Beats audio, Windows yammer-at-me center, Dolphin text editor
Xmarks, Citrx receiver, Listary, Intel AppUp (I thought I had uninstalled that!), Gateway IP monitor
Virtual Clone Drive, WinTV, Popfile, Net Extender, VistaSwitcher
D4, Glasswire, Teamviewer, Skydrive, PDF24
File uploader, chrome, RescueTime, Adguard, chrome notifications

In the tray: Win 10, Winpatrol, Avast, ProcessLasso, drive activity, System Explorer, Screenshot Captor, Ditto, network, speakers, and T-Clock

Oh yeah, you can see I have CrossHair running too. :-)

312

Living Room / Re: Security: Microsoft Security Bulletin MS15-078 - Critical

« Last post by x16wda on July 22, 2015, 06:01 AM »

And note that the MS15-078 bulletin does not include Win 2003. I think they waited 6 extra days to release it on purpose.

313

Living Room / Re: Computer Programming To Be Officially Renamed “Googling Stackoverflow”

« Last post by x16wda on July 22, 2015, 05:57 AM »

Heh! You remind me of this:

http://ex-parrot.com...-RFC822-Address.html

-Renegade (July 21, 2015, 10:16 PM)

WildGem says that's an invalid regex...

314

Living Room / Re: Partitioning or Not w. single HDD?

« Last post by x16wda on July 06, 2015, 05:32 PM »

But I say stable setup because then you have an idea how large to make the system partition.  The tendency is to make it pretty lean.  But if you like to install lots of utilities then over time you may find the size that seemed adequate starts to feel a bit tight.

-MilesAhead (July 06, 2015, 12:56 PM)

If you install Windows, the O/S will eventually, over time, decide to use more space than you have allocated to the system drive. Just sayin'.

315

Living Room / Re: Be prepared against ransomware viruses..

« Last post by x16wda on June 27, 2015, 04:17 PM »

Hey, you need to keep in mind that encrypting a file is a valid process. All you're doing is changing a file's contents. You could pull up a jpeg in an image editor and change it from a blue cast to a green cast, or edit your copy of the works of e e cummings and change it to ALL UPPER CASE or something. That's all that's happening. Heck, I encrypt files regularly -- the only difference is that I know the encryption key.

The more recent Cryptowall variants that I have seen are sneakier now - they don't always select every eligible file to encrypt. They also set the last-changed time stamp back to the file's original time stamp, so you can't tell from that what files were affected. Maybe that could be a clue to a/v software that something is amiss.

316

Living Room / Re: Be prepared against ransomware viruses..

« Last post by x16wda on June 27, 2015, 01:45 PM »

Does anyone know of any mainstream security software that uses a "honeypot" approach of watching for certain files being modified?

-mouser (June 27, 2015, 01:22 PM)

Our largest client got hit several times with Cryptowall, and another one got hit on a large file server -- that took over 24 hours to encrypt. After I thought about that, I sprinkled several test files (jpg, doc & xls) with known checksums in various places in the shares, and wrote a script to look for flag files (HOW_DECRYPT etc) and compare the checksums. If it finds any flag files or modified honeypot files, it looks at the owner of the flag files (since that's whose box is doing it) and spits out emails to get the box pulled and start remediation.

Mainstream stuff ought to be watching file creation, and as soon as it sees a flag file created it should shut down the remote client and start ringing alarm bells.

317

Living Room / Re: Be prepared against ransomware viruses..

« Last post by x16wda on June 26, 2015, 06:51 PM »

...and at today's prices, it's nice if you can rotate between an on site and off site copy (if you can, for example, leave a backup drive at the office or at your storage unit  )

318

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Utility to handle files/folders with illegal characters

« Last post by x16wda on June 19, 2015, 05:09 AM »

Would be interested in knowing if SetACL Studio will work for this. It has a 30 day trial that ought to give you enough time to try it.

319

General Software Discussion / Re: Nifty FREE Utility to do almost anything to a filename in Windows

« Last post by x16wda on June 17, 2015, 06:43 PM »

Very cool! I have used Bulk Rename Utility for this sort of thing, but I am always glad to find another!

320

General Software Discussion / Re: LastPass alternatives? (including premium LP)

« Last post by x16wda on June 16, 2015, 08:52 PM »

An online password manager provides a certain amount of convenience, and probably enough security for most casual use.  I just don't think I would trust one with anything really critical.

-xtabber (June 16, 2015, 11:19 AM)

That's what I use Lastpass for. It remembers the forum passwords and fills them for me, but it also allows me to create "secure notes" that contain hints - useful only to me - about passwords for more sensitive sites (like banking).

321

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: AdGuard: the better Ad Muncher?

« Last post by x16wda on June 10, 2015, 06:53 PM »

For this method to work correctly, Adguard imports its own root certificate in certificate store that your browser uses. If https-connection filtering is enabled, Adguard automatically detects browsers installed on your computer and installs the root certificate in their stores.

-Jibz (June 10, 2015, 03:48 PM)

However I installed Pale Moon for testing after Adguard was in place, and almost every site I go to triggers a warning. I have not yet seen a way to make it recheck for browsers to "fix"... there ought to be a button somewhere. Guess I will resort to looking it up. <grumble> 

322

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 Announced

« Last post by x16wda on June 08, 2015, 05:44 PM »

I've been trying to get my HP Stream7 to show me the option. I've left it plugged in and wifi'ed, installed updates... nothing yet.

323

General Software Discussion / Re: Scary Windows error: Failure to log in to profile, loading of temp profile

« Last post by x16wda on June 07, 2015, 01:09 PM »

How's the free space on the drive? I've seen that (on older boxes, anyway) when there's no space on C:. Of course that can be a temporary condition, but if you're on a comparatively small disk it's worth checking.

324

General Software Discussion / Re: Awesome software for kids

« Last post by x16wda on June 04, 2015, 09:17 AM »

It's not a game per se, but I have spent a fair amount of time with my boy running Stellarium. We'll go out and look at the sky and then come back in and figure out what we saw. For example, we figured out recently that we were seeing both Venus and Jupiter in the west in the evenings. And we always look for Cassiopeia. (Sam has always said W is his favorite letter!)

325

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 Announced

« Last post by x16wda on June 01, 2015, 08:09 PM »

I have seen the offer on Windows 7 - but not on Windows 8.1, where I would actually consider updating...

-tomos (June 01, 2015, 03:56 PM)

Just popped up on my Win 8.1 box during the day. I went ahead and opted in, I have full image backups. :-)

Hm, may need them. The box popped back up and after digging in it says the AMD Radeon HD 7660D video is "not fully compatible - you'll experience problems with your display."

That is not good. That's the on-motherboard junk that is working well enough for my two monitor system, but I already tried to replace it with an add-in R7750 card and the box just squawked at me. I better look into this again...