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Recent Posts

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376
General Software Discussion / Re: MS Office 2013 Home/Business - non-transferable (1 PC p.person) - Caveat emptor.
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 14, 2013, 09:34 AM »
Its really interesting - I was writing a comment on Amazon.co.uk yesterday in response to a review and the website description very clearly stated that the software was for one computer only and not transferable.

I have just looked and all versions have the information about licensing removed on the product pages.

Maybe MS is sensing the mood and backtracking already.

What nobody has said is how users (home or office) with poor internet speeds are supposed to install this software without a disk? I have loads of customers struggling with 256kb or less broadband speeds and even some still on dial up - are MS going to provide a disk for those people? It isn't so bad installing the basic package just start it at the end of the day and leave it to it but they are using the incremental download the bits you need when you need them approach which is a complete PITA at the best of times but some people are going to be REALLY unhappy users.

Actually if you go to office.microsoft.com and look at any of the Office 2013 packages (assuming you can find them as they are conspicuous by their absence - and only Office 365 show) you will find this statement under the Buy Now button:

For 1 PC, non-transferrable

If you go ahead and click Buy Now on the order page it clearly states:

For installation and use on 1 PC only. License cannot be transferred to another PC.

There is transfer management in Office 365 subscriptions - maybe that is what was being discussed.
377
General Software Discussion / Re: Avast Installs Chrome
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 14, 2013, 06:09 AM »
The link still works for me from the website

Go to www.avast.com

Click Support

Under Order & Renewals at the bottom click on "Software Installation Files"

and there is a link to the free version from the Avast servers (the link I posted earlier).
378
General Software Discussion / Re: MS Office 2013 Home/Business - non-transferable (1 PC p.person) - Caveat emptor.
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 14, 2013, 05:59 AM »
FWIW LibreOffice has just released version 4 with lots of collaboration tools. They are also systemtaically stripping out the old 'sun' components in the API. Interestingly the new version also opens MS Publisher and Visio documents (which I think is new and welcome).

The the other good thing about LibreOffice is it seems to have removed the need for Java to be installed - which is a big plus in anyone's book.

Re. Ms Office 2013 there is almost nothing worth the money and hassles of upgrading from Office 2007 or 2010. It just has a pig ugly interface to match not-metro (which it doesn't even run under) and throws you at subscription based storage every time you load and save files (OK you can change the defaults but that is how it is set up). It uses SkyDrive - which isn't compatible with the previous cloud solution for Office 2010 - at least not without searching for an update.

It isn't at all clear what MS will do if you buy a copy of Office 2013 and one f the following scenarios happens:

1) Failed motherboard replaced - is it a new computer?
2) On a desktop computer what if you change more than a few components (enough to change the machine ID at MS) - do you face reactivating issues?
3) Laptop stolen, damaged beyond repair or replaced under warranty?

The last point is particularly moot ... if you have a machine replaced under warranty and MS don't allow a reinstall of office do the manufacturers become liable to replace your copy of office?

I suppose MS could argue (but shouldn't) that theft or damage can be covered under insurance claims.

All in all there seems absolutely no reason to use MS Office post the 2010 version. Subscriptions might seem good value but most families only use Word and Excel at most and for one years subs have been able to buy a 3 machine perpetual license up until now (with transfer rights to new machines) - who in their right mind would pay a subscription cost to upgrade.

Doubtless MS will come up with something that breaks Office 2003 and 2007 in Windows 9 and by Windows 10 Office 2010 probably won't install forcing people into their corrupt model.

I have a current MAPs subscription which is due for renewal in March - I am seriosuly thinking of just buying a few copies of Windows Pro and moving to LibreOffice. The only other package I use from the subscription is Windows 2008 SBS - but it might be just the push I need to learn Apache and Samba!!!
379
General Software Discussion / Re: MS Office 2013 Home/Business - non-transferable (1 PC p.person) - Caveat emptor.
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 13, 2013, 06:33 PM »
LibreOffice is being developed with regular new releases ... plus it is totally open source.

OpenOffice is barely developed these days, rarely seeing new releases (even to fix bugs) and is Sun get their way the open source commitment will go down the crapper ... it is one of the main reasons LibreOffice spun off.
380
Living Room / Re: Website under attack ... help needed
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 12, 2013, 04:11 AM »
Thanks everyone - the common thread to the sites that have been affected seem to be out of date Joomla installations. I don't as a matter of course update Joomla websites for clients when they won't pay for support so some are still on Joomla version 1.5, and some have to by necessity because they use extensions not available for 1.6 onwards.

Having updated the affected sites to 1.5.26 (the final version in the 1.5 lifecycle) and replaced the .htaccess on each site everything now seems to be back to normal.

I have a lot more accounts running other stuff and none of those seem to have been infected so it looks like a Jommla 1.5.22 and earlier vulnerability that has been exploited.

I am going to start migrating websites to Joomla 2.5 as soon as possible!

In the meantime I will download each site to my hard disk and scan against a factory install of Joomla 1.5.22 to look for differences.

What a PITA, but thanks everyone for so many suggestions and quick help last night - esp. Josh who worked through a lot of stuff with me via IM.
381
Living Room / Re: Website under attack ... help needed
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 11, 2013, 05:59 PM »
Thanks guys - all ideas really appreciated.

Suffering brain meltdown at the mo - I will continue in the morning when I am fresher!
382
Living Room / Re: Website under attack ... help needed
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 11, 2013, 04:46 PM »
Update: Doesn't seem to be Javascript - I disabled Javascript and it still redirects.
383
Living Room / Re: Website under attack ... help needed
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 11, 2013, 04:41 PM »
Thanks I will take a look.

I have found a JPG in the root folder of the website that is not ours (relates to Memorial of Gaza Martyrs) which is a bit worrying.
384
Living Room / Re: Website under attack ... help needed
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 11, 2013, 04:18 PM »
Header file (not index) injected with a redirect code is one likely source.

Often in an up to date, 'secure' install that is on a shared server, another user getting compromised is enough.
-rgdot (February 11, 2013, 04:14 PM)

It is on a VPS - I don't seem to have any other sites compromised.

When you say header file do you mean an insert file (sucha as a function file) in the template or somewhere else?

Trouble is I have no idea how to track this down. I can restore the site but without knowing what has happened it is just likely to happen again??
385
General Software Discussion / Re: free web storage service that offers the biggest amount of data?
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 11, 2013, 04:16 PM »
Check this out tomos.

HTC/Samsung Bonus Space

https://forums.dropb...m/topic.php?id=63260
-cmpm (February 11, 2013, 02:42 PM)

Ah that might be why I got that. Dropbox was preloaded on my Samsung Galaxy Tab!
386
Living Room / Website under attack ... help needed
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 11, 2013, 04:10 PM »
A website I set up and host has been compromised but I am not sure what to do.

I can restore a backup before the attack but I really want to avoid it happening again.

The sits is based on Joomla. All frontend (public) pages redirect to random websites after about 15 seconds. In the backend this does not happen.

Anyone got any idea where to look for how this is happening?

I have looked at index.php and .htaccess and can't see any obvious changes in the code. Only two of us have admin rights on the website and the forum is not available without logging in. Even then normal uses are restricted to BBCODE and can't use any scripts or HTML. None of the site is open for comments.

The site is hosted under a CPanel account on a Linux server.

All passwords are long and random and the backend of the website uses a non-standard URL to get access with a 20+ character pin code just get to the login form.

Panicking a bit as I am a bit out of my depth with this sort of stuff.
387
General Software Discussion / Re: free web storage service that offers the biggest amount of data?
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 11, 2013, 04:21 AM »
I just signed up for Dropbox, and just by adding it to a second computer, my blackberry phone, my android tablet and sharing a folder it bumped up from 2Gb of storage to 50.25Gb of storage for free !!!

If anyone wants to sign up for dropbox use http://db.tt/s3OXypcQ to sign up and I will get some more free space!!!
388
General Software Discussion / Re: Avast Installs Chrome
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 10, 2013, 05:03 AM »
Direct download:

http://files.avast.c..._antivirus_setup.exe

If the link doesn't work just go to www.avast.com, click Support and then look at the Downloads section (bottom left).
389
Living Room / Re: Michel In Guides!
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 09, 2013, 03:23 PM »
Its about time the US did something about .com cybersquatting.

Can't happen any more on UK domain names, and if someone tries it Nominet, the governing body, reassigns the domain to the person/business that has the greater claim.
390
General Software Discussion / Re: Avast Installs Chrome
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 09, 2013, 07:21 AM »
True - I am not complaining but I do tell all my clients never install anything without going trhough custom or advanced options and reading what they are installing. I have cleaned up computers that have had literally half a screen of toolbars in Internet Explorer and the owner has no idea how any of them got there.

Having said that I think that anything that installs any extras or changes settings such as home pages and search engines by default are despicable. Unfortunately it seems the norm these days, even from companies like Microsoft who try at every opportunity to install Bing crap everywhere and change home pages to MSN - even through windows update!!!
391
General Software Discussion / Re: Avast Installs Chrome
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 08, 2013, 03:46 PM »
 I agree but if you don't use custom install on every install you deserve what you get these days - especially when you are using free software.
392
General Software Discussion / Re: Avast Installs Chrome
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 08, 2013, 02:48 PM »
Just downloaded Avast Free. It does install Google Chrome and Google Toolbar for IE but it is a very clear option if you use custom install.

I suspect the problems described above are from CNET's policy of using their own installer wrapper with built in crapware, not Avast.

Personally I refuse to download anything from CNET these days as their files are always stuffed with unwanted "surprises".
393
Living Room / Legitimate app breaks popular encryption - EFS, BitLocker, TrueCrypt ...
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 06, 2013, 07:37 PM »
In the current Windows Secrets newsletter EFDD can crack popular encryption, even with tough random passwords:

Conventional wisdom has been that files protected with good encryption can’t be cracked.

But a new, $300, wizard-driven app can unlock BitLocker-, PGP-, and TrueCrypt-encrypted files, folders, and drives — no matter how strong a password you’re using.

It’s the sort of story that could keep you up at night. Last month, Elcomsoft released the Elcomsoft Forensic Disk Decryptor (EFDD; more info), a program that opens encrypted files without trying to guess your password or attack it with brute force (Wikipedia info). In fact, the actual password is effectively irrelevant. A long, random string such as bS2f#[voIT+?@=Uq3a,.B provides no better protection against EFDD than would "password" or "12345."

See http://windowssecret...tion-systems/#story1 for the full story.
394
Living Room / Re: Gummiboot restructured to allow Linux to work on SecureBoot systems
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 05, 2013, 01:10 PM »
Carol[/b]: is AMD still in the motherboard game? I thought they quit both motherboards and chipsets several years ago?
-f0dder (February 05, 2013, 10:16 AM)

My system (less than a year old) has a 990 chipset from AMD ?? OK it isn't an AMD mobo but the CPU and chipset are both by AMD.
395
Living Room / Re: Gummiboot restructured to allow Linux to work on SecureBoot systems
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 05, 2013, 09:05 AM »
Microsoft has a loophole in that incorporating UEFI is (technically) left up to the hardware manufacturers. Exactly how "voluntary" it is in practice is another matter - and one that will need a court ruling to finally decide. But thats something that can (and likely will) be dragged out for decades if it ever comes to that.
-40hz (February 05, 2013, 08:57 AM)

Not strictly true - anyone OEM wanting to ship Windows 8 has to use a system with SecureBoot enabled. It is part of the OEM agreement - unless it has changed recently?
396
Living Room / Re: Gummiboot restructured to allow Linux to work on SecureBoot systems
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 05, 2013, 05:44 AM »
Intel will get out of the traditional desktop motherboard business
-40hz (February 04, 2013, 08:19 PM)

If AMD have any sense they will clean up.

Actually if Intel and AMD (and other major manufacturers) simply refused to produce UEFI motherboards that give MS the key to the lock, or even go back to standard BIOS board production only,  it would force MS to respond, especially now Windows 8 is in the wild and can't be installed on SecureBoot systems without a valid key. If MS play hardball it will be sales of Win 8 that will suffer.

Seriously where are the class action law suits in all this? The EU caused problems for MS because IE and WMP were included in Windows, this is far worse as it effectively removes competitors from selling product at all!
397
Living Room / Re: Apple trademarks its retail store design
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 03, 2013, 06:52 PM »
The trademark covers Apple's use of a "paneled facade" of glass, recessed lighting units, and perhaps most obviously, lined rectangular tables.

 :o :tellme: Anyone seen a school classroom recently? Hell there might be the odd computer there! Maybe even an iMac .... are schools going to get sued now?
398
General Software Discussion / Re: FastStone Image Viewer
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 03, 2013, 11:29 AM »
I will have another look at Faststone.

Used to use ACDSee for years but gave when consistent rendering bugs with Canon RAW images persisted across numerous paid upgrades. Every time I reported the bug they said it would be fixed in the next version, which of course they didn't supply to annoyed customers for free. Eventually I gave up.

I now use Lightroom, but it would be useful to have a lighter browser and quick touchup tool that works.
399
Living Room / Re: Mid-range DSLR Camera Recommendations
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 03, 2013, 11:22 AM »
What about this?  ;D


-Mark0 (February 03, 2013, 08:49 AM)

Hey I want one! Be really good for astronomy, but you'd need a hell of a telescope to mount it!!!
400
General Software Discussion / Re: Removing dual-boots
« Last post by Carol Haynes on February 02, 2013, 10:55 AM »
You need to boot into Windows 7 advanced boot options (F8 as Windows starts).

Use a command prompt and use:

FIXMBR to write a new MBR

then

bootrec /rebuildbcd

to rebuild the boot system in Windows

There are full instructions at:

http://pcsupport.abo...cd-store-windows.htm

but it doesn't include rewriting the MBR first.
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